You'll Pass By Many Roads but You'll Only Walk One
by SourCrumb
Summary: Nora has saved the Commonwealth and she'll go down in history as a true hero, but what kind of toll does that take on a person? Nick Valentine was supposed to be there to steady her, but his rejection takes her by complete surprise. John Hancock is more than happy to help pick up the pieces.
1. Risks Untaken

The thing about detectives is that they not only see everything, they remember it too. They remember everything! Ask one about any place, any person, any event.. if they know of them, they can recall practically every detail in near-perfect clarity. It's part of the job after all, to pick up on the small things as well as the big things; not to mention the little tiny details that usually connect most of those things together.

It can be hard to hide anything from a private eye.

It can be even harder to surprise them.

"You can't be serious, doll."

"I am serious."

"It doesn't make any sense at all. You're not like me, I'm not like you."

"Does that have to matter?"

"You might as well marry a toaster."

"Was that a proposal already?"

She laughed, but he sighed. It was a defeated sigh, not the happy kind she had hoped for.

Had expected, to be honest.

Her shoulders started to drop, but she swallowed hard and did her best to remain standing, challenging, mocking... she had to keep herself strong as steel.

Strong and cold steel.

"Nora... Nora, I can't. We can't."

Her hands are very naked and cold now, just hanging in the too-still air between them. The sight of his own hands returning to his sides rocks her heart hard. Suddenly she can't help herself and she gripped her own elbows, crosses her arms, a defense shield she needed to manage, to keep together the bits she wasn't expecting to break.

She tosses back her head and laughs; The sound is so close to normal that it makes it easier for her. It's easy to pass everything off with a casual shrug, like it was no big deal, more of a joke she let get too big and certainly nothing with real emotions or feelings, no, never. It was fine.

It had never been real.

And she knows that's not true, but it also is at the same time. It doesn't matter if she believes in him, if he's more man to her than anyone else could ever be.

He doesn't believe himself that he's real.

And she can't change that.

The office is quiet.

He's not asleep, of course, no need, of course, but even if he could...

He can't stop thinking about those sad, sad eyes.

He can't stop replaying every flicker of hurt she fought to hide.

Can't stop remembering how she had dug her nails into her skin, trying so hard to be so steady.

He sighs.

It doesn't matter. He knows it couldn't be real. How could it have been?

A human- a living, breathing, beautiful human- needed another human beside her.

Cold steel could never do.

Eventually he turned off the lights.

He doesn't need to sleep.

He closed his eyes.


	2. A Ghoul and a Synth Walk Into a Bar

"Well, well, well! If it isn't the dumbest bucket of bolts this side of Diamond City!"

"Can it, Hancock. I'm not in the mood."

"From what I hear you're not in the mood for much these days."

Nick narrowed his optics, but said nothing. Hancock's tone was ice cold and he knew his old friend was smouldering with hardly hidden anger. The metal man reached for the ashtray sitting on the bar, ground out his half finished cigarette and sighed, feeling as if he'd rather be turning toward a firing squad. "She's been through here recently, I take it?"

"Why? You lookin' for her?" He could feel Hancock's eyes boring into him, burning holes, The ghoul was doing nothing more than leaning against the counter, toying with his empty bottle of beer, but there was hostility crackling in the air around him. Nick knew he was in the eye of Hancock's storm.

Nick nodded. "I just want to... well...was she... Was she all right?"

Hancock snorted in disbelief. "And here I thought you were a detective."

"She wasn't all right?"

"No, Nick. She wasn't. She's not."

The synth fumbled in his coat pocket, pulled out a crumbled packet, pulled out a fresh smoke. He had no idea what to say to that.

"Do you know how many glasses of Nuka and rum she poured down her throat to try and shake you? It's higher than you'd think."

Nick had only seen Nora drink a handful of times, all of them for good reasons. She still usually ended up sniffling by round four, no matter what. She was always a weepy drunk, even if the tears were happy. He'd never known them to be sad. "Is she still in town?"

Hancock put down his bottle, picking at the edge of the label, now no longer bothering to even make eye contact. It took him a long time to answer. "I know she'd want me to tell you where she is, but I'm not going to do that."

"Hancock, please, if I could just see her-"

"Yeah, and do what? Make her cry more? You broke her heart!"

Nick was on his feet and speaking loud, struggling to defend the actions he knew hadn't been right in the first place. "I had to!"

"Bullshit, Nick!" Those black eyes blazed as they turned back. "You do this every damn time! Some pretty little thing gathers up the courage to tell you that she's falling for you and you just shut down! You show them the door, you give them your little "But I'm a robot" spiel-"

"It's not a spiel!"

"Sure, you tell yourself that. Tell yourself that you're all metal and no real feelings, but don't bothering trying to tell me." Hancock snorted again. He remembered the red rimmed eyes of Nora, remembered the way she'd sobbed into his shoulder, how she'd sobbed again when the booze betrayed her and she'd been sick over his jacket. How small and miserable she'd looked. Didn't bother him one bit, he wasn't about to turn her into the streets for any reason. He'd cleaned her up, reassured her, tucked her into his own bed and fought himself like hell to stay away.

He'd always been fighting himself when it came to Nora.

"You and me, we've never had any bad blood, Nick. We go way back and I've seen you ignore woman and I've seen you notice them. I know when you're interested and when it comes to Nora, you've been interested for a long damn time. I'm not stupid. I see the way you look at her and DON'T piss me off by denying that."

Nick lit his smoke with a shaking hand, Hancock's words buzzing through his processors. "Even if you did see me look at her," he began slowly, "even if I did look at her... Hancock... I'm not enough for her. I never could be."

"Well I'm so sure you gave it so much thought-" The ghoul's sarcasm cut deep, and Nick's circuits sparked red hot in response.

"You don't have a goddamn clue how much I've thought I've given her! Do you think I like this? Do you think I like being a rusty heap of metal and watching someone as incredible as Nora bat her eyelashes at me while I know I've got nothing to offer her? She single-handedly saved this city, my city, hell, she built her OWN city out of the ruins of her own home! She is everything and she deserves everything and everything is the exact opposite of what I can give!"

Hancock scoffed, pushing his empty across the bar, pulling his hat low over his eyes. "If you think someone capable of saving every single one of us isn't capable of knowing her own heart, then I don't know what to tell you Nick. Pull your head outta your ass and wake up. You've got a miracle waiting for you. You're being stupid, and I don't have time for stupid. You're better than this. She's better than this."

Without so much as a last glance to Nick, the Mayor of Goodneighbour swept out of his bar, his piece said. His own nerves were suddenly rough with jagged edges and he knew that nothing but Jet could smooth them out at this point.

As for Nick, he ordered himself a double scotch and stayed, silently drinking, processing until the sun came up, still no closer to knowing what to do.


	3. An Almost Uncomfortable Comforting

Hancock was a very talented ghoul. He could talk the legs off a table. He could shoot a Raider's head off from a mile away. He could smoke and drink and even inject with the best of them. He was well known as a lover from the lips of both men and woman, and no mayor had ever been as loved by his city. Really, when he sat down and actually thought about, he pretty much had it all.

Didn't he?

Seems it used to feel that way, but these days...

"John?"

She was stretched out on the beat-up lounge chair beside his, staring up at the sky. Her voice was rough from the near hour of crying that she'd been unable to stop, her eyes still all puffy and red. He'd seen a lot of people cry, for a lot of various reasons. It always got to him, but her? She was especially dangerous for other various reasons. Somewhere between the third bowl of mac and cheese and the second bottle of vodka, he'd gone and said he wouldn't mind a bit if she called him by his actual name, now that they knew each other so well.

God, did he regret that now.

"Yeah, Sunshine?"

"Was it crazy of me? To think I could have a chance with him?"

He inhaled deeply on the cigarette between his lips. She might have been big on tears, but she was bigger on questions, not in times like this. His nerves pulled and his hand swung automatically to the tin inside his pocket. He plucked a pack of smokes from his jacket instead. He threw them onto the table between them, picked up her lighter which was already there. The ashtray was overflowing, an empty pack already crumbled beside it. Seems he'd been smoking much more lately, popping fewer pills, mixing up his usual drug routines. Things were difficult enough in his head without being intelligent rough to analyze his thoughts on top of it. He needed his brain to stay quiet, to be muddled and dim and far away from that beautiful view called clarity.

Fuck clarity.

"I think he's the crazy one," he told he frankly. He focused on the glowing end of his cigarette, watched it flair up against the darkening sky. They were up on the roof of her home in Diamond City. His gaze caught the garish glow of Valentine's Agency signs, and he winced. He knew the detective wasn't there; he'd seen to that personally, knowing it that Home Plate (as she still actually called it) was most private place she had access too these days. The wounds she had to lick were deep, and nobody likes being a spectator sport. She got enough gawkers in Sanctuary as it was, the savior of the Commonwealth and all. Goodneighbour would have been the spot he'd chosen to hole up in, but Nora had no place there to call her own. She needed to cling onto what she had right then especially seeing as she was feeling like she'd gone and lost everything all over again.

"You really think so?"

"Yeah, I really do. A gal like you offering up her heart like you did? I think his wires might finally be starting to fray."

She sighed deeply. "I wish I'd been smarter. I wish I didn't offer him anything... Ugh." She drained her glass of squeaky clean water and made a face he only caught in his peripheral. "I also wish I'd never set eyes on that damn Blamco box. Why did you let me eat so much?"

"Isn't that what you do for women with broken hearts? Feed them and listen to them before snapping them out of it when the time comes? Seems reasonable to me."

"No wonder Nick didn't want me. I'm a whale, full of salt and radiation and fake cheese." She laughed, and he glanced her way as a flurry of movement began. It was a glance that turned into a look the second he realized what she was doing. She was wearing an old men's shirt, the cuffs rolled to her wrists. She swam in it, that and a large pair of bulky, wonderfully warm wool socks pulled up to her knees against the late summer chill. He had no idea where she thrown her jeans once she'd shimmied out of them. Didn't care either, to be honest. All she had on for bottom was a pair of grey cotton panties, panties he suspects Mama Murphy makes and sells on the sly.

They were the best part of her outfit, far as he was concerned.

The spark of her gold plated lighter woke him back to reality and he hoped she hadn't noticed that he suddenly had his eyes glued to her thighs. She was pretty deep into her cups, as one might say... Maybe a tab or two of Mentats wouldn't be such a bad idea after all... he had to be more careful... just not too careful.

"I guess it figures," she said bitterly, pausing to exhale a terribly large amount of smoke for such a small woman. "I mean, what was I thinking? That I would come back, Institute defeated and he would just sweep me off into his arms? Life isn't some kind of fairy tale. I didn't save the entire damn Commonwealth just so some robot Prince Charming would marry me and we'd live happily ever after! I'm not saying I need a man to validate all that I've accomplished. It's not that I feel like I earned this, or something. I just thought we really had something... He was just so damn good to me, John. I just feel like... like... "

"Cheated." He flicked his own lighter shut.

She paused, considers the word against her smouldering feelings. "You know what? You're right. I do feel cheated. I know he liked me-"

"Oh, he likes you."

"If he likes me, he would be here."

"Sometime it's not that easy."

"If you liked someone, wouldn't you want to tell them and be with them?"

When he finally found words to answer her, he spoke them in a voice that he knew wasn't right. "That question is a loaded weapon, Sunshine... don't think waving it around is a good idea, particularly right now."

She gave him a funny look, her blinks slower than normal. For a moment, there was panic inside him, but it faded when she sighed in defeat. "Was that a riddle? I'm too drunk right now. No more riddles."

Hancock watched as she closed her eyes, settling her head back down, turning back to the sky. He didn't even want to blink, just kept his eyes on her, drinking her in. He wanted to memorize every detail of her face, wanted to commit it all to memory.

Oh yeah. The Mentats were kicking in.

Her profile was different now than when they started out together. He'd never noticed before. Not surprising. He remembered the first time she broke her nose. He had offered to try and fix it, but this was early days for them and he didn't even have a nose, was he kidding, and besides, Bunker Hill was around the corner. He'd directed her to the doctor there while making sure she kept her head back, wasn't that what people did back then? Deacon had told him that they did, but who really knew with Deacon anyway. Then Deacon vanished from his mind, replaced with the memory of how she'd wordlessly reached out her hand to him when the doctor was about to begin resetting her nose, how he'd walked to her side equally as wordlessly. Her hand had been rougher than he anticipated and her grip had been strong, and something inside him twinged as he felt what it was like to be needed by one person rather than the many.

If the first nose break was a badge of courage for surviving what he would later learn had been her first encounter with a Super Mutant, the second was the participation ribbon that only came out when Hancock needed a fast way to embarrass her. For some reason, maybe five months into her new life, Nora had thought that trying to teach the actual rules of baseball to the citizens of Diamond City was a great idea. All had gone swimmingly until she ended up with a baseball to the face when Nat got a little too into one of the demonstrations. He'd shouted louder than he'd meant to as he got to feet, ran to her side, recognizing that cracking sound all over again.

He'd stooped down by her kneeling, bleeding figure, hand on her shoulder, asking if she could make it to the doc. When she had lifted her battered face, she'd taken a deep breath and locked eyes with him, only to say the words that continued to rattle around in his mind to this very damn day.

"Can't you do it for me? I'd rather it be someone I trust."

Forget a baseball to the face; that had been a fully customized Swatter to the gut. He, John Hancock, breaker of hearts and faces alike, had somehow gone and fallen head over heels from the vault dweller of Vault 111. A woman who had been baking pies and feeding her newborn baby not long ago with nothing to worry about other than looming world destruction, her husbands big speech, and choosing between dressing Shaun as a pumpkin or as a ghost for Halloween.

Shit. The Mentats had been a mistake.

"Are you all right, John?"

He hadn't realized he'd sighed out loud. "Yeah, sure. Just... just tryin' to figure out this Nick hangup," he bluffed.

"Did you get a chance to see him when you were back at the office? I heard he might have headed to Goodneighbour."

Double shit. He didn't want to lie to her, but he certainly didn't want to add to her misery.

"The only thing I can see as an issue is maybe the whole Synth and Human thing, but really... I thought he had moved past a lot of that stuff when we closed the Winter's case."

Ugh, he remembered that. It had been a wild goose chase all over the Commonwealth, scrounging for endless holotapes. She'd been a mess during the three weeks it took to hunt them down. She'd run herself ragged for that damn hunk of metal and he'd told her she was nuts then. "I don't think Nick Valentine is ever going to be able to separate the man from the bot. He thinks he's two different people. Pretty hard to be with anyone with a life like that."

She frowned and stubbed out her cigarette. "He said he could be done with all that. That he had justice. That at least he could have that for himself. That was all he wanted, he said. One thing to call his." She stopped then to wipe at something on her face, one the side he couldn't see. "I thought that maybe..."

He silently finished her sentence inside his head and winced. He was going to punch that damn synth square in the face the next time he saw him, friendship be damned.

"Would your being a ghoul keep you from being with a human?"

"Hey, a person only really need a pulse for me to consider them, Nora. Thought you'da known that by now." He gave her a pointed look that dissolved her into giddy giggles and she pulled her knees to her chest, wrapped her arms around them. The little grey panties dug in just between, getting smaller and smaller and he felt his mouth almost water at the sight. He can't help himself from scooting up, to sit directly across from her. "Hell, even if neither of us knew it, it's possible I've even banged a synth or two somewhere along the way myself."

"I mean, I know you've slept with humans." She stuck her tongue out at him. "Soooo many humans, there have been many, many, many stories about that..." she trails off for a moment, cheeks turning slightly pink. "I thought you just might feel different when it came to love as opposed to sex."

"I used to think I did. Not about only wanting to love Ghouls, not that part. I'm no bigot when it comes to any of that stuff... I just never thought of any of it having to do with me, you know what I mean?"

"I don't think so... You don't think you'd fall in love because you're a ghoul?"

He's having to dodge her glances now. "Nah, nothing to do with that. I felt this way even before the face melt. Never had much time for love... not much interest. Always seemed to be more trouble than its worth in the end."

She didn't speak for a long time, taking his words in, processing his viewpoint. "You said you used to think that way?

He nodded.

She inhaled deeply then before looking up, up into the starry night above them. "I hope Nick will change his mind too one day."

He exhaled much more than cigarette smoke.

"Me too, Sunshine. Me too."


	4. The Most Dangerous Place to be is Alone

Sanctuary had come a long way.

What had once been a bombed out husk of a neighbourhood had been leveled and rebuilt into a bustling new settlement of men, woman and even children, with more on the way. Humans, synths and ghouls all mixed together, sitting beside each other in the bars or shops that had appeared, and visiting each other inside the various homes that were popping up like toadstools. Traders came regularly, purified water was in constant production and the crops had never been better.

Nick had never been so miserable.

~

It had been several weeks since his time in Goodneighbour. He'd essentially stayed until the caps ran out and he was forced back to the spot he once planned on calling home. He'd prefer being in the office, but Hancock had made it clear that Diamond City was not a place he should turn up for the foreseeable future.

Almost all of Nora's traveling companions had chosen Sanctuary as their spot of land at the end of the day, and she was insistent that each person more than deserved their space for all the work they'd helped her with. MacCready had been hammering away at his place for months, determined to have a family home ready for when his son was able to travel, and Cait's little nest had turned out quite cozy. As he passed it by he saw new plastic flamingos frozen into struts and preens on her patch of front lawn. Nick's own shack was hardly touched. Being a synth meant he really didn't need a fridge or bed or any bathing area and all his knickknacks and whatchamacallits were already packed up at the agency.

The shack had already been set up with a metal bed frame and a fairly fresh-looking mattress. Some kind soul had pieced together a bright patchwork quilt for him while he'd been away. He found it folded it neatly at the end of the bed and he took a moment to shake it out and admire it. The stitching was excellent.

He wondered if there was one on the end of Nora's bed too.

Glancing through the cracks in the wall he was able to see her house across the street. He'd wanted somewhere close to her, and he was grateful he'd been one of the first to be offered a spot there.

He'd been grateful for a lot of things.

He sighed deeply and put the blanket down, sitting on the edge of the mattress next to it.

Why had he gone and ruined everything?

~

Hours passed, and Nick eventually started to make his way around. He shed his jacket and hat, finding a coat rack lurking in the shadows of a closet he didn't know he had. Inside was also a toolbox, a med kit, and a chem box, each stocked with a few essentials. Leave it to Nora to make sure every new home came with the basics. Extracting a screwdriver, he passed some time fiddling with the joints of his wrists. He'd gone over them twice, trying to focus on the turning of screws, the quiet scratching of metal on metal.

Instead, his mind was filled with thoughts of Nora.

They had become so close so fast while they searched the commonwealth for her boy. Nick had never liked kidnappings of any kind; the high emotions, the higher stakes, it was all so draining. Not to mention the fact that kidnappings easily went south, and with that damn Institute swapping people around and snatching bodies left, right and center, it was rare they had a happy ending, if any concrete ending at all.

The case of Shaun had been different. Shaun had been taken as an infant, a newborn at that. What kind of person stole a newborn? Shaun hadn't even lived a few months when he and his parent's been tricked into their ticket to the future. He remembered the terror in her eyes. As far as she was concerned, she had blinked and a bomb was dropping. She had blinked and been stuffed into a tube. Another blink led to watching her husband, God rest his soul, fighting to keep Shaun and getting a bullet to the head for his efforts. And then that final blink that brought her here, to the Commonwealth. The year of 2277- hundreds of years away from her former friends, family, her entire life. All she had been left with were wedding rings, a head full of memories, and arms that ached to hold her baby again.

Nick had wanted to give her back that baby so damn badly... but then look how that turned out.

~

"I found him."

Nick felt that even if he was given a total system overhaul, fully deleted and clearly reinstalled, that he would still remember that day perfectly.

He'd been going over the Montgomery case when the door had opened. He'd been alone in the office with no clients expected, and if he'd had a heart it would have been in his throat. It hadn't even been twenty-four hours, there was no way she was already back... but there she was.

The previous day had been the big one. He'd been there to watch Nora vanish into thin air and blue sparks. Other people might have (and did) say that Tinker Tom looked like he had a screw loose, but Nick knew loose screws. He trusted that the man knew how to use his tech, and so he had full faith that she had made it to the Institute. What she would find once she got there? He could only hope for the best there.

It was silly, but he stayed awake listening to that classical music station. He did have to admit that was brilliant. It was still playing when she walked into the room, eyes wild and darting, hands clenching and unclenching. For a moment he was worried the trip had caused some sort of damage, but then she'd said those three words and then broke down into the ugliest, harshest tears he'd ever seen. She crumpled to the floor and clutched at her arms and fell apart while he watched. Immediately he assumed what he thought as the worst; the boy was dead. He had crouched beside her to try and calm her down, having dealt with this unfortunate turn of events too many times. He reached out with his good hand and laced his fingers through hers, squeezed tightly to let her know he was there. If nothing else, he wanted her to know that at the very least, she wasn't alone in this terrible moment.

But then things went and swerved as she'd opened those big empty eyes and sobbed out what she'd learned, that Shaun was older than her own father had been, that he was grey and sick and stubborn, her words coming and going, swallowed by her anguish and her loss. Her free hand had reached out for his, and she'd taken it before he could pull back, twined her fingers of flesh and blood around the framework of cold steel that made up his own. He'd been struck by that action, and before he realized he was processing the motion, he gathered her up in his arms, pulled her into his lap and let her cry long and loud against his metal chest, tucking her head under his chin, whispering everything and anything he could to try and ease the pain he could in no way compute.

~

Back in the present, Nick groaned. All that pain, all the suffering... she'd been through so much and come out the other side stronger than even he thought she could be, which was saying something. Someone like her really did only come around once in a blue moon, a legend, a marvel, someone larger than life.

She was so, so special.

How could a broken-down reject synth like him ever be worthy of her? She had to know she could do better. Hell, as far as he was concerned, she deserved better.

"Hey! You. The one sulking in the dark."

Nick lifted his head. He'd been so distracted, he'd missed the knock at his doorway. When had it become so dark outside? How long had he been lost in memories?"

"Hellooooo? Nick, you in there? Hello Nick, Irradiated Earth to Nick, come in Nick."

It was Piper, standing in his door frame, her face full of concern. The red of her coat shone under the streetlight and water poured off her hat. "Got a story you need to here, pal. Blue's still staying at Home Plate but, well...and things aren't... it's just that..." She shifted from one foot to the other, and he realized she was soaked practically though.

"Did you walk straight here from Diamond City through a downpour?"

"Nick. I'm worried! Nat is worried too, she'd starting to freak out, she loves Blue, we both do and you-" She broke off, but picked back up immediately. "I just think you need to come back! You have to talk to her. I think it's important. If you don't... I don't think she'll ever be the same again."

Nick's fingers curled and he couldn't lift his eyes from the floor. His voice was hard and brittle. "You've got the wrong guy. I can't fix this." His volume lowered as his shame rose. "Not when I'm the one who broke it... who broke HER this badly to begin with."

He had been expecting an outburst. Piper wasn't known for her cool head, and what he had done was so awful, so stupid-

A hand registered on his shoulder. The skin was chilled and damped. "Oh Nick." The warmth in her tone was incredible. "Nick, Nick, Nick. C'mon. We're going to my place. I'm giving you a long, long talk and I'm making myself a large hot drink, and I can only do one of those things in your stove-less hovel."


	5. Poised on the Slippery Slope

Hancock hadn't been worried when they were thrown out of the Colonial Taphouse.

He'd known a ghoul like him was pressing his luck just walking into the Upper Stands, let alone swaggering into the middle of their fine drinking establishment two hours before close, It had been a good day. He was on an outstanding natural high (along with the standard) because Nora was smiling again. Hell, she'd even laughed once or twice!

They had been out hunting down green paint of all things, a request of Piper's, but she'd ask his help in dragging home along a few extra cans in a few extra colours. "I'm going repaint Home Plate," she explained. It looked to Hancock that the "feeling bad about things" portion of the heartbreak was over for her and she seemed determined to make a start fresh for herself. He'd offered to buy them a celebratory rounds (To New Beginnings!) as soon as they got back to Diamond Cit. He'd also offered up her his arm to lead her to the Upper Stands and she'd nodded, taken it, still flush with leftover adrenaline from slaughter raiders.

"Why not?" she had mused.

He'd forgotten how loud they could be once they started really talking (and drinking) and it only took them five and two beers to reach max volume. More importantly, it took only three of his Preston Garvey impressions for one of her shouts of laughter to bring Security over, scowling mostly at him, at his unashamed ghoul face. He'd watched with furrowed brows as she turned crimson, believing herself to be the reason for the booting, but he'd quickly led her out of there before it got too bad.

"Wasn't your fault, don't think that. Not here, not in this bigoted town. How dare a ghoul and a human even be in the same room together, let alone the same table! Fuck 'em. Besides, they wanted double the caps for beer that was just as weak as the Dugout Inn's. But that does remind me... you know what really soothes over hurt feelings caused by assholes?"

The tiny smile that came back to her face was better than any shot to his system, but the Moonshine, yeah, that was also pretty damn good. They'd been three shots deep with a dozen beers somehow scattered around them when Scarlett warned them they were close to last call.

"Last Call? No way, we've hardly been here."

"Sorry guys. Can't help it if you came in so close to closing time. Not every city is twenty-four-hour boozing and doping like Goodneighbour is," she said, giving Hancock a meaningful look. Just what meaning, he was not sure, but he did know it was nothing good.

This time he'd slung an arm around her waist, helping her up the stairs. She wasn't a total mess, but she was certainly close. She darted away a little once they were outside. It was raining again, had been all day. It felt amazing against his drunk warm skin, and he watched Nora fling her arms open to the sky and tilt her head back. "This tastes so amazing! Hancock you need to taste it! I want to drink allllll the rain!" The water quickly plastered down her hair to her forehead, and her beat-up trench coat began to darken. She laughed, and straightened back up, turning to look over at him over her shoulder. There had been dried blood sprayed across one cheek that he hadn't noticed before. He'd thought it had just been dirt, but now that the rainwater mixed with it, it changed from dormant black back to vibrant red as it began to wash away.

He had never wanted anyone so badly in his life.

She called out his name again, now several paces ahead and his heart gave a violent twist at the sound. He wanted to hear her say it again, needed to hear her cry it out, fuck fuck fuck he needed any and all drugs and he needed them all now and now and now.

By the time he got to Home Plate she was already inside in the makeshift bathroom area in the even-more-makeshift shower that she and Sturges had put together. Her wet clothes had been peeled off and tossed onto chair backs to dry near the radiator thing she'd hooked up. She'd tried to explain it to him, but he'd been more than a little tweaked at the time and it all went over his head.

He could hear her humming.

He shucked off his own wet things, casting aside his hat first, then his coat. The rest of him was more or less dry, so he made his way to her kitchen set-up and started poking through the boxes, bottles and cuts of meats inside. He popped the top of a Nuka Cherry and poured it into two large glasses, topping each generously off with more rum. Figures her drink of choice would be one with rare ingredients. That was his Sunshine all over. Nothing was ever easy.

He pulled out two steaks of Brahmin and had them half done in her very battered skillet by the time Nora walked around the corner. She was in that button up shirt again, a different pair of woolen socks. Jeans though. Damn. A ghoul could only get so lucky, he supposed.

"You always mix the best drinks." She purred the words into her cup, gulping greedily at the liquor and cola. He grinned and she held up a packet of cigarettes. He took two, lit them both,and then passed one back to her, smoke curling from the holes of his nostrils.

"Sister, you deserve the best and nothing else," he winked. "Besides, you need the loosening up. Things have been too tense for too long. I mean, think about it. You've hardly had time to breathe since you woke up."

It was true. He'd missed the beginning bits, sure, but he'd stuck around for parts that really mattered. Fuck, she'd been still so fresh when she first walked into his proud little city. When he thought of the way Bobbi had managed to trick her, ha! He'd like to see her try and fool her now.

Nora smiled up at him, blinking in that slow steady way he was beginning to like so much. "It does feel nice to finally let my hair down... figuratively speaking at least." She touched the damp bun on the top of her head and he chuckled. "Even back before the bomb fell, I was either up all night studying or up all night working, or up all night with Shaun..." One hand drifted down to gently touch her stomach and he frowned. "God, things are so different now... It must be almost a year... another month, maybe? And then a year."

Hancock whistled low. "A year of survival against all odds... Remind me if I forget, we'll have to celebrate."

She snorted and then drank. "Let's make it to there first, shall we?"

They cleaned their plates in silence after that. She stumbled to her feet, collected the dishes, waving him away when he tried to help. "I spent my entire life training to be a lawyer and my entire adolescence learning how to be a good wife. Don't deny me a chance to use my skills."

He watched her slip the dishes into the sink, and tilted his head slightly. There wasn't some right here. He calculated all the alcohol she'd consumed. She was far too upright right now, her speech a smidgen too perfect.. She reminded him a bit of when he'd mix his bourbon with mentats, especially when it was the berry flavour. and wait, no. No, that couldn't be right. Nora didn't take chems.

Didn't she?

He coughed, lit another smoke. Who was he to get into her business like that anyway. And besides, even if she WAS using something else, anything else, wasn't he the best person for her to be with? Hell, she was in the safest spot possible for a chem break; right here, sitting in Home Plate, all alone.

With him.

Besides, she was smart. She'd tell him if she was playing with new toys. She didn't keep secrets. She knew she didn't have to. Knew he'd never judge.

Because he wouldn't. Couldn't.

"Hey Sunshine?"

"Yes, John?"

He can't.

"Ah, nothing, it's nothing. Just wanted to check in... see that you don't need a break or a rest or anything. I know I tend to party harder than you're used to."

She looked over at him, over her shoulder again, and her eyes were suddenly bashful. She was unspeakably beautiful. "Well... actually... That reminds me. There was something I wanted to ask you about."

His posture was suddenly perfect. "Name it."

"It's just that it's... different. I mean, it's not one of my usual requests." She poured the water into the sink and left the dishes there to soak as she came back to the table. "It's just that...I just feel... I need to be different. I want to try different things! I can't be the Nora of 2077 anymore!"

"You want to try something... new."

"I want to be someone new."

He wanted her to be nobody but herself.

And then Nora bit her lip, took a deep breath, opened her mouth and said "Hancock. Let's go on a chem binge."


	6. A Change in Character

"They still turn your lips red!" Nora marveled at her reflection in her bathroom mirror, and Hancock snorted from the next room.

"Oh yeah, I forgot they did that. What with being mostly lip-less now and all."

"You know, I used to buy a new lipstick every week, trying to find a colour that matched this one." She pursed her lips at herself and laughed. "Even after the end of the world, it's still the same shade. What on earth do they put into this stuff?" She squinted at the bottom of the Mentats tin, trying to understand the ingredients. "I think it might take an entire box for me to be smart enough to decipher this."

"Probably kill you first."

She sighed, and walked back into her living room. "Are you sure I can't have anything else?"

"What, you think I'm letting you shoot Psycho in between your toes in the first half hour?' John was sitting there, legs stretched out, ankles crossed. He had his arms splayed on the back on the couch, and his eyes were on only her. Without his hat, she could see that there were traces of blond running over his scalp. She wondered what colour his eyes were once. Not that she minded the shiny deep black that was looking her up and down, wide with appraise.

Hancock could always make her feel like a million caps.

Dropping to the couch beside him, bold from lingering alcohol, she leaned herself against his side, letting her head come to rest on his bony shoulder. "And I can only have five?"

"For now." She could just see his face if she lifted her head a little bit. His grin was wicked and her shiver had nothing to do with body temperature. "Look, I love the enthusiasm, but give it time. Another ten minutes and they'll kick in. And hey, if not, I'm here to adjust your dosage then."

"Yes please. Adjust my whole damn life, please?"

"I dunno if we need to go that far."

"Maybe I want to go that far."

He didn't say anything, but his arm dropped down to encircle her shoulders. His skin was warm, like crinkled the back of her neck. She was always surprised at his touch, how he never felt like she expected.

"Thank you for doing this with me, John."

Hancock smiled. "Nothing I like more than guiding someone down the crooked path to chem land. Especially first timers."

"Are you sure you won't take anything?"

"Nah, not yet. I want to make sure you start off well first. Bad trips are easily avoided if it's early, but harder to break if they've really kicked in."

They fell silent, Nora focusing on her thought patterns and Hancock concentrating on filling up every ashtray she had. Before she knew it, she started to think about how different everything was. How did she get here? How did she come to be sitting on a mended couch with a smoking ghoul next to her and coffee table laden in various chems and boxes. Was she really going to go ahead and try these things? Was she going to intentionally poison herself with all this junk, just for a chance at feeling better? Who even was she anymore?

Nora's past before the bombs had been so stiff and planned and assumed. "Go to school, get your degree, but you'll end up married with a baby and a string of pearls around your neck in the end." Her mother had been frustratingly correct. Nate had swept her away. She might have never initially wanted to be a mother, but she had always wanted love. Nate had a lot of love, for both she and for Shaun. He would have been a wonderful father, if only he'd had the chance.

She could remember the day she'd told him she was pregnant. His entire being had lit up, his smile wider than she'd ever seen it. He'd swept her up in his arms and swung her around the kitchen and for just a moment, she hadn't been terrified any more.

She had realized she wasn't alone.

"Hey... Hey, you all right there?"

Nora hadn't even realized that tears had started leaking from the corners of her eyes. "Wow... I was just remembering Nate and life before and it was so vivid... I lost total track of where I am."

Hancock had taken her by the shoulder to gently shake her back to realty, but he let her go when he was satisfied her eyes weren't still unfocused. "Well then congratulations. You're officially on your first mentat high. Memories can be as good as a trip to Irma since your brain is working overtime. It's able to pull up more information so your mental picture is as clear as a bell. Great if you have good memories, but bad if you focus on things in your past that were upsetting."

She nodded slowly, amazed at how quickly (and how randomly) all her thoughts were now pinging around inside her head. "That makes sense. Got it then, no more focusing on anything about the past." She paused. "But I don't know, maybe I'm smart enough now to figure out what went wrong with Nick and I?"

Hancock shook his head. "Not recommended. I know it sounds like a good idea, but you'll only get stuck at some point and then you'll start to miss him and you'll end up crying. And I don't want this to be a bad night, so if you're only going to use these chems for moping over Nick-"

"Stop, don't say his name." she groaned and stood up, his arm crashing down to the cushion as she did. "Ok, I promise then, I will not speak of, nor will I think of Nick in any way shape or form for the rest of the night."

"Good." Hancock was staring at her face and she knew it was with pleasure.

And she liked it.

Two more hours passed.

Nora wrote out a scientific formula that fully explained why they needed to eat noodles for all future meals and nothing else. "It just adds up, Hancock!"

He'd decided her brain was adorable and also overstimulated. He reached for the coffee table and she watched his hand hover, saw him mind calculating, deciding which drug could next join their party. He'd had a few mentats himself by now, and it was easy to weigh the pros and cons.

"Jet is probably the best, but it's not a very lasting high..."

"We NEED to get noodles. We have a forty-minute window for this."

"Well then I guess you'll just have to advance quickly."

He takes her arm confidently, ready to roll up her sleeve, but she pulls back as if he'd burned her somehow, as if his touch has eaten through the fabric. "Sunshine?"

"It's nothing. I hurt that arm, you know, with the raiders. Probably won't have the correct blood flow because of the trauma, and whatnot. Here, use this one."

She could tell he didn't buy a word of it, but she also knew Hancock would offer her no challenge either. He simply switched to her other arm, exposing pure, clean, unmarked skin. He swept his thumb over it in wonder and they both watched as goosebumps broke out from her in response.

"You can pretend it's just a stim if that makes this easier." His grip is so firm and she stays as still as a statue. The sting of the needle is hot, but his precision is nothing but perfect. She dimly remembers this one from her pregnancy. Her correct identification blows him away, she can tell, and she can also tell from the way he pulls back that he wanted to move forward.

She's not sure she'd mind.

"There. Just enough to make stepping outside and into the light of day a little less harsh. Pretty sure at least one of us is actually feeling very hungover under her layer of chems."

Her laugh is horse from being up all night, and she ignores her standard trench coat, pulling a thick black knit sweater on over her head instead. "You're probably right. I don't even want to think about how I'm going to feel when I come down from all this."

"Then don't." He swept up his coat and plonked his hat onto her head, capturing her bun.

"You gonna stay and deal with a withdrawn, hungover me?"

"Of course."The sincerity in John's eyes makes something flutter. "I said I'd take care of you."

She swallowed the something down, but can't help but take one step- one tiny little step- toward him. "Well, I dunno... if it's going to be that awful, will the high from this binge even be worth it?"

His own step to her is not tiny and as he adjusts the hat on her head, she feels his fingers lingering, brushing lightly over her hair. When their eyes meet, it's like she's been frozen. "Oh, I'll make it worth it."

Nora suddenly can't seem to breath and she knows it has nothing to do with chems.

Then she notices the clock behind him and swears. "Thirteen minutes!"

The noodles are very important.


	7. Unwanted Evidence

Nick didn't know what Piper had expected him to do. Nora was a grown adult, able to spend her time doing whatever with whoever she chose to do. He couldn't very well scold her like some petulant child. Piper had implored him that all she would need to do was talk to her, sure, as if that was the easiest thing in the world, to just walk up to the woman whose heart who stomped to pieces and then demand she mourn you in a way that you find more permissible.

Then again, Piper had a good head on her shoulders, and she could read a room like nobody else. If she was concerned about Nora, there was a damn good reason. So he made his way back to Diamond City, and kept to the shadows he knew so well from years of stakeouts. He'd expected to find them at the noodle bar, but there was nobody there. It was too quiet. The last thing he wanted to do was just knock on her front door, so he headed to the office instead to decide his next move. Might as well pick up a file or two while he was in town as well, get some work done. He probably wouldn't see her until the next day anyway, if he saw her at all. He was halfway there when he was stopped by a member of DC Security.

"Hey Nick! You lookin' for Nora and Hancock?"

He grimaced. "Wouldn't say 'looking for' exactly. Piper asked me to stop by, make sure things were on the level. Doin' her a favour, is all. Just another day on the job.."

The guard scoffed. "That ghoul? On the level? Nick, is your programming screwy?"

"I'm beginning to wonder."

"Well, you won't find them here. They took off yesterday, with nearly all of Solomon's stock. Heading back to Goodneighbour, and good riddance to them. Do you know they got themselves banned from the noodle bar? A Diamond City first!

"Shit. How'd she look?"

"Honestly? Good. Did somethin' to her hair. But I dunnno.. something ain't right... She's different. Shifty, almost. Couple a times during my late shifts? I spotted her up on that roof of hers, building and using... shame. Hate to see her go down that path, after all she's done for everybody and everything."

Nick could feel a gear somewhere, literally grinding inside his head.

 _using all the chems... like you used up her._

"Using what, exactly?" he asked, ignoring that sinister voice at the back of his mind. "We talkin' hard chems here?"

"Pretty sure, but I hope I'm wrong. Coulda just been cigarettes, maybe?" He shifted his gun to his shoulder, and sighed. "I know that between the two of them, this city is pretty dry when it comes to smokes now."

"Thanks for the recap, officer. I'll check out Home Plate. You say she was on the roof?"

"Yeah, yeah... and listen, Valentine? I hope she's ok. You two seemed happy. Whatever it is that's got her down, I'm sure it'll pass. Just maybe get her out of that ghoul's influence, you know? Before he does too much damage?"

It wasn't exactly breaking and entering if you had a key, was it?

Nick remembered the day she'd slid it across his desk. "You and Piper both have one. I feel safer knowing that you two can keep an eye on things. I trust her like a sister, and you... well... I trust you most of all." She'd blushed, admitting that to him, and he'd been damn proud to hear it, happy to claim the key and water her plants from time to time... everything had been so much lighter then.

The way things had shaken out for them... was that trust gone now? Would she still want him with a key to her home, able to just open the front door without her around and stroll on in?

 _probably not._

Switching on the lights, he swept the room with his eyes, looking first, not wanting to disturb the "crime scene", as it was. The smell of stale smoke hit him hard, and he sighed. He was a hell of a detective but he felt like even if he wasn't, he would have been able to tell Nora wasn't in a good place. The place was a mess, littered with empty mac and cheese boxes, dirty noodle bowls, and enough open and empty liquor bottles to make his insides seize. The coffee table was also covered in empty syringes and turned over mentats tins. They had better all have been from Hancock, he thought. It also looked like every ashtray she'd ever scavenged had been dragged out and put to use. She'd never seriously smoked before, only borrowed one or two of his when situations became too stressful for her, so where had all these empty cigarette packages come from?

She'd never let this place get so messy, not once. It had actually been the opposite. Cleaning had been a way for her to shut down her mind, and he had once teased her mercilessly when he caught her organizing his case notes in order to distract herself from Preston's constant pleas for help.

Finished with the living room and kitchen, he made his way up the stairs, not quite comfortable snooping in her bedroom yet. Nora had made up a second sleeping area there for whoever she was traveling with in case they had to crash for a night. More mentats containers, a few stray shotgun shells... and a perfectly made bed.

According to Piper, Hancock had been staying with Nora for several days already before she decided to visit. That meant the ghoul had been here nearly a week and yet the bed he should have slept in was as neat as a pin.

 _you're assuming they slept._

He switched off the entire train of thought.

Instead he headed for the roof, climbing up the metal ladder and pushing the hatch door open with his shoulder. The fresh air felt good. He took a deep breath, and then let it out in a completely defeated sigh as his gaze fell to a wooden milk crate bulging with empty drug canisters.

He had really, really wanted that guard to be wrong.

He took in the lawn chairs, and yet another overflowing ashtray. He could tell which were hers, marked on the ends by her pinkish lipstick. But there were other colours too, one a deep red, and one that seemed almost black. Visitors? Or just trying new shades? Reinvention was quite common after heartbreak, sure, but reinvention with Hancock at her side?

Nick sat down heavily on one of the chair and drew out a smoke of his own. He lit it, inhaling as deeply as his mechanical lungs would let him. It wasn't that he didn't like Hancock. Hell, he considered him a friend! Hard not to, with all the years they'd shared, all the events they'd been a part of. Being a synth meant Nick had seen a lot of people grow up and he'd buried a lot of good people who had simply outlived him. Hancock understood what that was like, and the two had a strange bond because of it. Still, even if he was a friend, Nick knew he was the type of friend that was best in small doses. Hancock's idea of a party had never been to Nick's taste. As a detective, he'd seen what too many doses of Jet or Med-X could do to a person all too often. Relationships destroyed, families divided... that was the side of chem life Nick was familiar with. It was the morning after, never the night of. Hancock could live any way he wanted, and Nick was fine with that

He was not fine with that kind of life claiming Nora.

Rooting through the box, he had expected to find mentats, probably jet, anything that counted as a low level chem. They'd been there, sure, but what had caused him to curse loudly was what he found at the very bottom, hidden away under crumpled paper and still damp-from-tears napkins; three empty syringes of Psycho.

He couldn't get to Goodneighbour fast enough.


	8. What This Road Could Lead To

Coming back to Good Neighbour with Hancock made Nora remember celebrities of her past. Everyone was so thrilled to see him that they all rushed to greet them on his return back into the city.

"We missed you, Mayor!"

"Lookin' Good, Mayor!"

"Hancock, drinks on me tonight, ok?"

He'd grinned at them all, basking in the attention, loving every second of it. His eyes were so wide with excitement that it made her laugh out loud.

Well, that and the fact that she was still drunk.

She'd stumbled coming down from the curb, and he'd caught her smoothly around her waist. He'd gotten very good at doing that, and she was very grateful for his agility, his strength. She would have been black and blue without him around to protect her from herself.

"Easy there, sister. I think we need a break, wouldn't you agree? That walk took more out of me than I'd like to admit."

Her grin is liquid, spilling across her face. "Maybe that's because you're very, very, very, very high?"

"And yet, I could still keep climbing. To the statehouse?"

"To the statehouse!"

~

"Tell me again, about life before the war?"

She blew her hair away from her eyes, watched as every strand rose up, separated, and then fell back down. It was amazing every time. Even though she'd been doing it for seven straight minutes, it was still amazing every. time. "Why? It's boring."

"If I thought it was boring, would I have asked?"

"Ok, fine."

He was sitting at his desk, riffling through the drawers, unsure of what his personal stash was looking like these days. Nora was stretched out along the length of the couch, her feet dangling over one arm and her arms behind her head. "It was boring though... I mean, it had it's moments sure, but..."

"Like when you were a lawyer?" He knew he was taking a risk, poking around in her past, but Nora seemed to be turning out into quite a chatty little chem user. Not what he'd expected. More than he'd expected. He wanted to learn as much as he could while he could.

She sighed, happily for once, and sat up. "I loved being a lawyer. It was hard, going through school. Mom and Dad, they didn't really support it. Women were only just starting to enter the working world back then." She coughed, and rubbed her arms. "Do you have a blanket or something? It seems cold all of a sudden."

"Little bourbon will put some heat back into you." He was already pouring himself a second glass. "Here, you take this one, this glass looks like it's cleaner."

"Thanks."

"I don't get it though. What were women supposed to do if not work?"

"Get married. Pop out babies. Raise said babies. Die." She drank.

"You're kidding."

"Nope. Oh, and it had to be in that exact order. No babies before marriage."

"Sunshine, I think you were meant to be frozen."

She laughed, loud and harsh. "I think you're right." She took a sip of her drink, and immediately made a face. "I think I might have to call it a night for the booze. Or call it a day. I don't have a clue what time it is right now."

"Me neither. Not a big fan of exposed windows in here."

"And here I thought Sunshine was your favourite thing." She drawls the word 'favourite,' which hits him in all the right places. "Anyway, my schooling was only approved because mother was convinced I would snag a rich lawyer for a husband. Never mind becoming one on my own, that would never be good enough. Then I was supposed to be a housewife and clean and cook until I ended up in my grave."

"Thought you said you liked doin' that stuff. You said being a wife was better than you thought it would be. Didn't you?"

"Oh, I liked some parts of being a wife. Just not those ones." She winked, and it took a moment for it to register what she was talking about.

"If you're as good at them as you are cleanin' and cookin', your husband was a lucky fucking guy."

Nora burst out laughing with real laughter this time and he watched her head toss back, exposing the lines of that tanned, scratched up neck of hers. His grip tightened on a canister of jet.

His staring doesn't go unnoticed. "John?"

Fuck.

"Impure thoughts?" she teases and he grinned wickedly.

"Sister, if you only knew..."

"Why don't you tell me?"

He blinks, taken aback at her boldness. Who was this creature with the smouldering eyes? What had happened to Nora? "You really want to go down that road, Sunshine?"

"I thought it was a loaded weapon."

"I thought you didn't get that joke."

She opens her mouth to speak, but is interrupted by a wide yawn instead. "Mmm, how about one more hit of jet? Jet sounds so lovely right now. Just one more hit and then I think possibly, to bed?"

Her eyes connect with his as she says those last words and there's a gleam there that's bright and dangerous and he has never, ever seen it there before.

"Jet might be a bad idea then." His tone is cautious, warning. He can feel a dangerous glint growing in his own eye, but she's captivating and he wants her. He's wanted her for such a long time.

"Why is that?" Her voice is hardly more than a breathy whisper.

"It'll knock you out cold... Great if all you want a bed for is to sleep in it."

"What if I wanted to do something else?" Her arms are up around his shoulders and he can't stop himself from taking her around that perfect waist, can't help digging in his fingers until he hears the softest little moan she's ever made in his presence. He looks her full in the face and she licks her lips and he knows this actually happening.

He knows he should stop her. Knows she's too drunk, too high, too tired to be making this decision.

But deep down?

He also knows he's not strong enough to care.


	9. The Harsh Glow Of Morning

Hancock hated everything that morning.

He hated the pounding in his head. He hated that it was getting harder to find a decent vein in his good arm. He hated the sun for daring to sneak out above the horizon, and he especially hated bourbon.

Until he got out of his bed and realized it still wasn't empty.

Until Nora rolled over, reacting to his fading warmth by gathering more of his sheets to pull around her, never waking from whatever dream was giving her that hypnotizing smile.

Until he noticed she was half naked.

Then he just hated himself.

~  
He hastily tied his belt and threw on his jacket before heading out to his balcony. She was still there, sleeping like a baby. Waking her was the last thing he wanted. She needed to sleep; for health reasons, obviously, and to give him time to have a chance to pull himself together. Which he knew was going to take far longer than usual.

He lit his breakfast cigarette with slightly shaking hands, and never had stale smoke tasted so good to him. His head began to clear and he quickly started putting things together. He remembered Nora asking him about what growing up in Diamond City was like, and he remembered asking her about being a lawyer, and oh yeah, he totally remembered how they both got chemmed out of their minds and how she'd begged him to take her to bed.

Fuck.

Then he remembered he'd done it.

FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK.

He inhaled deep, running a hand over his skull. Had they actually...

He stood there in silence for a long time, watching the sunrise. When his smoke burned out, he didn't bother to relight a new one. He wanted to run. He needed to stay.

The memories couldn't be held back forever. He needed to go over them, couldn't help but go over them, remembering the way she'd looked up at him, how he'd found himself undoing each and every button down her shirt, the sound of her gasp when he'd tipped back her head to taste her jawline, and the softness of her lips as they'd explored his cheeks, his neck, his own lips-

Holy fuck, Nora had kissed him.

She'd kissed him with those rich red lips and he'd parted the cloth of her shirt, stopping when his fingers hit the softness of her skin and not of worn cotton. She hadn't even been wearing a bra. "I kinda, sorta hoped this might happen," she'd told him and he swore out loud, couldn't help it, fuck, he better not have woken her, fuck, fuck, fuck.

Hancock couldn't deal with this on smokes alone. He snuck back inside to gather supplies and make sure she was still asleep. She was.

Once he was back outside, he plonked himself down onto the wood. With practiced hands he rolled up one sleeve, gave himself a double dose of Med-X, popped back a handful of mentats and focused.

He relaxed quite a bit as he then remembered stopping to take her by her bare shoulders, the shirt crumpled around her arms. He'd pushed her gently back, looked her in those wild, bright eyes. "You sure you want this, Sunshine? I'll stop. I can still stop."

"Why would I want to stop?"

" Nora, seriously, you're high enough to get ghoul-curious. I don't want to, I dunno... take advantage of you."

She snorted. "Since when?"

"You think I'd do that?"

She had only shrugged, one eyebrow raised, challenging. "Maybe I want you to."

He'd pretty much torn the rest of her shirt off, living for her shocked laughter before cutting it short with kiss after kiss, easing her down to his mattress, wanting to get completely lost in her. He could feel her fingers brushing down his lower stomach, wriggling past the barrier of his pants, and he responded with a low growl that caused goosebumps to scatter the skin of her arms. He'd reached up to pin them down, to keep her busy little hands still while he focused on unwrapping the greatest present he was ever going to get.

But then he heard a cry of pain and he'd thrown himself away, thinking he'd hurt her, thinking he'd ruined the whole moment.

~

It turned out that the moment was ruined. Not by him, though, which was something, at least.

His thumb had pressed the inside of her arm and woken the angry infection that had begun to form there, under her repeatedly pin-pricked skin.

Needle-pricked, more like.

For a moment, he'd just stared, not wanting to process that she had been keeping secrets, that there were parts of her she didn't want him to see. He had been so sure that he understood her, but maybe he really never had.

"Oh, Sunshine," was all he managed to get out before she'd started to cry. She'd probably expected him to yell or lecture like a certain synth who he would not name. Instead, he'd only leaned down, and kissed her, just once, just one more, just in case...

It was all right, he remembered telling her, no, he wasn't mad, never would be mad. He was only worried, worried she'd get sick, or worse.

Then he'd gone to get his medkit only to find her out cold when he'd gotten back. The usual checks assured him she was only sleeping, the need for real rest finally winning out despite her best efforts. He'd carefully cleaned her arm with all the know-how he had, wrapping it neatly with bandages as white as snow. Not that he knew what snow was from personal experience. Nora had told him about it.

Why hadn't she told him about this?

He didn't judge her, of course.

He just wished he'd been there.


	10. A Cursory Glance

It was late when Nick strolled through the gate of Goodneighbour, and he sighed automatically as the "unique" scent of it's sparsely populated streets hit his sensors. He headed directly for Hancock's office, but was redirected by a sleepy Fahrenheit towards The Third Rail. "They've been there pretty much constantly for the last two or three days. Guess Baby's First Bender is going better than expected."

He was starting to feel rundown, having been on high alert and traveling on his own for such a long time. Not to mention the overtime his processors were putting in; he was amazed that steam hadn't started rising out of the cracks between his seams.

Still, to be so close, to know she was in the roughest bar in the commonwealth, vulnerable... No. This needed to be finished.

He nodded at Ham, and the ghoul whistled a low note. "Valentine... you've looked better."

"Thanks a lot." But he did remove his grimy coat, wanting to at least make an attempt. He handed it to the bouncer gratefully. He and Ham had done their fair share of working together on various cases here and there, and he could always be counted on for accurate information. Even if it did sometimes come with a hefty cap count.

"You here for your girl?"

He also didn't miss a trick.

"She's not my girl."

"Sure, sure. She's here though. Lookin' like a knockout to boot, so consider yourself warned."

"I hear she's made... changes."

"I suppose I should also warn you that she's pretty damn messed up."

"Any more bad news to share?"

"Just that if you really don't want her for your girl, you better make it clear. Our very own Mayor seems to be rather... keen... on occupying the position."

Nick's optics dimmed slightly before blinking back to normal levels. "Just don't lose my coat."

~

He'd like to say he'd never imagined Nora like this, but that wouldn't be true.

 _gotta hold you accountable._

He's often imagined her this way.

She's wearing a dress he's never seen, one of black, slinky fabric. The straps are hardly more than threads, and she keeps having to haul them back into place as they slip down her shoulder. Her legs are crossed, her heels are high and that wonderfully shiny hair, usually caged in a bun, is at last free to fall across her shoulders, as freshly bright as the day she stepped out of that vault. Her lips were red, her eyes ringed with black and grey shadows.

She's every fantasy Nick Valentine- both the man and the bot- has ever had, a femme fatale in the flesh, sitting on a dilapidated couch across the room, clutching a highball glass in one hand and gesticulating with the other as she talks to the person beside her.

He finally stops staring at her to realize it's Hancock himself that's sitting next to her, looking as relaxed as a cat in a sunbeam. His eyes are half closed, but they're just as glued to Nora as his own were. He breathed in deep and slow, trying to slow the coolant pumping inside him.

 _so how many times do you figure they've banged?_

Nick shook his head and tried to ignore it. He didn't want to even deal with that. Not now.

So he decided it was time to slip back into his detective's coat, if only in his head. He knew The Third Rail's layout like the back of his hand, so it was easy for him to blend in with the crowd and sneak behind them, keeping to the shadows and acting as confident as he could.

 _confidence was never your strong suit, Nicky._

Settling casually into a chair that faced away from them, he began to access his limited functions. It should be hard to fine tune his hearing for their voices, and he swore to himself he would only listen as long as it took to reassure himself (and Piper) that Nora was just patching up a broken heart, not turning into some hardened chem head. That every thought he was having was wrong.

He had never wanted to be wrong before.

"I wish I could just stop yawning. I don't even feel tired until I yawn and then it's all I can think about."

"Could just go back to bed."

 _back._

"Nooooo... I wanna be awake forever."

"Well, I'm afraid you weak little humans can't do that."

"Hey, you need sleep too!"

"Not nearly as often."

"Well, at least I have all my toes."

"Ouch, sister. I'm wounded, truly."

She laughed. It had been months since Nick had heard that laugh, even if it did sound as if it'd been scorched a bit round the edges. There was a click deep inside him and something felt warmer. He instantly shut down his audio. She was fine. Her voice might have been rougher than usual, but there was happiness in it. She was joking with Hancock. She was smiling. It was possible that she'd had a few mentats in her system, might account for the math, but over all... she seemed all right.

No need to get too deep into this. The Pyscho had probably just been Hancock's.

He was good with that.

He shouldn't have been good with that.

~

He'd stayed a little longer, more to rest than anything else. He nodded, pressing a finger to his lips when Magnolia spotted him from the stage, and she'd nodded back before looking back out into the crowd. She could always be counted on for an extra set of eyes. She was one of the good ones.

Eventually the bar became more crowded, and Nick felt he had enough cover to finally leave. He stood up and slid through the other patrons to the other side of the room. He could see his path through to the exit. It was as easy as perfectly preserved pie.

So of course he had to ruin it.

Of course he needed to take that one last look.

Of course he chose to turn his head the moment she'd shifted, lain back on the couch and pillowed her head in Hancock's lap. He had one arm behind his own head, and the other held a lit cigarette. Nick watched as he lowered it towards it, and he watched when instead of taking it between her fingers, Nora merely lifted her head and caught the end with her lips; lips with edges just pressing against the edges of Hancock's fingers.

He had forgotten he'd even been holding the bottle of beer, until he shattered it in his grip.

 _oh, now this could get good._


	11. System Lockout

It was as if every single pair of eyes in the room had locked in on him. Nick could feel the leftover beer on his hand, slick and sticky, studded with tiny glass shards. He expected Hancock, but it's Nora who first shot off the couch at the sight of him, though Hancock was quick to put a hand on her arm, just below what appeared to be a bandage. He spoke to her, and she spoke back, pressing a hand to his chest to ease him back to sitting. Hancock's eyes do not leave him, and he can feel them on his back as Nora leads them both into the thankfully empty VIP room.

"What are you doing here?"

He tries to think of an explanation beyond just "checking up on you" but he can't because that's exactly what he's doing, and he knows it's ridiculous. But then he realizes that up close, Nora no longer looks like she's ok. The shadows under those cold, hard eyes are not intentional. There are bruises on the bandaged arm, and he worries she was too high and injured herself.

She's shaking, shoulders pulled in, and her pupils are dilated. He has no idea what chem she's on. He does know it's more than one.

 _don't remember her looking quite so used up before_

The Nora he traveled with for so long doesn't even seem to be there anymore.

"Nick. What are you doing here?" she repeats the question, but her voice is angry and sad and he's never seen her so low, not ever.

"Piper... Piper was worried about you. Asked me to check in."

She doesn't believe him, he can tell. "Oh, really? Well, need I remind you both that I am a goddamn adult woman and I don't need to be babysat?" She sighed, running a hand through her hair, messing up her bangs just like she used to on the road, when she would get frustrated or angry with a situation she could in no way help.

"Nora... she's not the only one worried."

Her bark of laughter is a single harsh sound, and she looks at him with eyes that scream 'Are you fucking kidding me?' "If you are referring to yourself, that's rich. Are you running low on memory?"

"Oh, cute. Computer jokes."

"You broke my heart!" Her anguish tears him apart inside.

 _you've got it bad for her, Nicky._

"I know... I know."

"No! No, you don't." She slashes the arm holding the bottle through the thick air in between them, and she sways slightly in her too tall shoes, the combination of liquor and chems racing though her, making her heart beat too fast, her breath a little too short. "You were there for me when I was at my worst. I thought I could always count on you, thought you'd never lead me down some path of lies. I saw the way you looked at me, every time, only when you thought I wasn't paying attention." She snorted, and one hand braced herself against the wall. "You think only you can put pieces together and figure out what other people think? Well, newsflash, you're not. You can't lie to a lawyer, Nick. You of all people should fucking know that."

She's crumbling to pieces and her eyes have gone glassy and he knows she's trying not to cry. He wishes he could just hold her, could just wrap his coat around her and take her back to the Agency. He wants to tuck her into his bed and help her get better, give her every dose of addictol he can find. He wants to help fill her cheeks in and stop those pre-war curves from being eaten away by post-war dope. He wants to keep her safe, but he knows... he knows.

 _so then do it. go ahead. give in._

He wants to.

 _give. in._

He can't.

"Nora, you have no idea..." He stops, unsure of how to explain what he can't admit. "You can still trust me. I need you to trust me. You can't think I would hurt you intentionally."

She looks down, and he wonders if she's watching the way her fingers are trembling too. How much has she had? How long has this bender been going? If Hancock was in Diamond City with her for a week and now another half had gone by...

How long could she keep this up?

 _c'mon Nick...just open up those robot arms... she'll fall right into them._

 _let me catch her._

He decides to try a different tack.

"Whatever you think of me... whatever you feel I've done to you, intentionally or otherwise, Nora, you can't just fill a wound with booze and jet and expect it to magically heal faster. This is the last place you should be!"

Her eyes narrow. "Here we go. The good St. Valentine is going to give me yet another lecture of the dangerous of a chem-filled life. You know, Hancock said you would do this."

The artificial breath inside him stops. He can feel switches inside him, flicking over, one by one, feels the anger rising faster than he can handle. He needs to walk away. This is not going to go anywhere good. He's going to lose it.

But he can't just leave her here, where she's clearly in more trouble then she knows.

 _but you can't just take this lying down either, now can you? here, let me help._

Jealousy floods through him, hot and thick, and his control is slipping.

"How can you even look at him like that?" He says the words quietly, half hoping she won't hear them.

"Excuse me?"

"I'm a detective Nora. Finding stray hearts is half my paycheck. If you think I watched the two of you and saw nothing there..." He can feel his good hand coiling up as the jealously bled into fury. This was not how this was supposed to play out. He had to get a grip on himself.

 _don't feel you need to be polite on my account..._

Nick chooses his words carefully. "Nora, listen to me. I'm sorry, I am so, so fucking sorry. I know I messed this up, messed it all up bad... But you can't seek solace with Hancock as your guide. He's leading you somewhere you'll never come back from. He can overpower. He can be reckless.

"What, was I s'posed to just cry over you forever? No, no way." She takes a step back, and he knows that if she bolts now, he'll have lost her forever.

He just wants to hold her so badly.

 _do it._

"Nora, please. Just look at yourself right now. You're trembling like a leaf, you look like its been days since you've last eaten-"

"Hey, I fueled up with plenty of mac and cheese, thank you very much." Her words slur, she's just so damn drunk and he utterly hates himself. "That and plenty of noodles, oh yeah, those were ingested. In large quantities. So we're good, we're both good, thanks."

She waves him away as if he were a mere bug, and in many ways, he thinks she's right. "When was the last time you slept?" He continues to prod, and she folds her arms, leaning against the wall. "Do you even have an conclusion planned for this little party of yours?"

She rolls her eyes, and drinks deeply from her bottle, throwing her head back to get every last drop. Her hair swings backward, and the light is able to perfectly illuminate her neck, her collar bones... And then he realizes there are bruises, two of them, small and deep purple, just underneath her jawline...

The sort of bruises that can only come from one activity.

 _I win._

It's as if he's been reset to a default he had no idea he ever had. Before he can help himself, he slaps the bottle from her hand, smashing it to pieces on the floor. Her wrist, so thin, all bones and skin, is trapped hard in his bad hand, and the usual fear of hurting her is missing.

There is actual fear in her eyes. He is unable to process it.

"Nick, what are you-"

"He's a fucking junkie, Nora! You strip away that charm and you strip him of his title, and all you're left with is a ghoul junkie who has long forgotten the tolerance of humans, who will lead you down a dark, deep pit and leave you there to die when he realizes you'll never keep up."

There are tears on her cheeks. He cannot care.

"I know you loved me Nora, I know. And I-"

He can't say the words. He's actually unable to say the words.

His head feels like an icepick has been jammed inside and is digging through the metal and dragging against the wires. He can feel that his grip is too hard, but he can't seem to loosen it. He has to stop and he can't stop and this is bad, this is so, so bad.

 _Oh, you have no idea._


	12. A One-Sided Fist Fight

There's blood dripping down Nora's wrist.

Hancock can smell it.

It's staining his coat as she wraps her fingers around his arm and pulls. She's yelling something, he knows he can hear the word 'stop', but he's not going to.

He's got Nick pinned hard against the wall, one hand on the synth's already-damaged throat, the other pulled back to deliver yet another hit.

"Hancock, stop it! Stop!"

Her voice is getting clearer as it becomes more and more obvious that no matter what he does, no matter how hard he hits, Nick isn't going to fight back.

"You have to stop! John!"

"Why!?" He can't help snarling at her as he drops his fist and turns to her horrified face. "He hurt you, Nora! Look at your fucking arm!" His rage is bright and hot and she shrinks back from him.

But what did she expect him to do? How did she want him to react to walking into a room to find him shouting at her, clutching her arm in his bare metal hand with enough force to break the skin.

"This isn't helping!" Her face is drawn, pinched with her emotions and he feels something hot wash over his heart. "Please, John? Please, please, just stop?" Her eyes are so big. So big and so sad and he can tell that she really, really does want him to stop.

What else can he do then?

Nick coughs, but Hancock only increases the pressure of his fingers, chem-fueled and furious. "I don't care if I have to go feral to do it," he spits the words into the detective's now dented face. "I will tear you to fucking scrap if I see you anywhere near this woman again. I have shot men apart for even LOOKING at Nora in the wrong way. I can and I will make you pay, and the only reason you're going to walk out of here alive is because she wants you to. Do you understand!?"

Nick nods, stiff, desperate. He might not need to breath, but he can feel Hancocks fingers along the gaps of his neck, and he knows he's one good hard pull away from losing most of his essential wiring.

"Good. Now get the hell out of Goodneighbour."

He let go, allowing Nick to fall heavily to the floor, taking pleasure in the smashing of his steel body against the cold concrete.

"Don't you ever show your fucking face in my city again! Don't turn up in Sanctuary either. Just hole up in that sad little agency of yours and stay there until you finally power down for good."

Nick got to his feet, looking like he'd just witnessed a second bomb drop. Clutching his probably (hopefully) broken throat, he left immediately, not looking back, not even bothering to say one word in response.

The adrenaline drains out of him as quickly as it had rushed in, and he realizes he can feel her hands reaching for him, pawing at his chest, burying her fact against his coat. He's suddenly very tired.

"Sunshine..."

He wraps his arms around her, holding her as tightly as he can. She's shaking hard, crying into her hands, covering her face. "Shhh... shh..." he murmurs what he hopes are soothing sounds against her hair, reaching up to stroke it lightly, knowing that she liked that, hoping it would help calm her. "It's ok, Sunshine.. he won't hurt you anymore. It's over. Come with me, c'mon now.. "I think we should call this a night."

He was never letting her out of his sight again.

* * *

"I'm sorry."

It was much later, and they were together in his bedroom. His medkit open on his rumpled sheets again, but this time she's awake for it. She watches in silence as he cleans the shallow gashes left from Nick's grip. It was easy to forget how strong he could be. Hancock should never have let them go off alone.

She shook her head sadly. "You couldn't have known what would happen. Don't feel bad."

"Can't help it..." He sets aside the cloths and antiseptic and takes her wrist in both his hands, turning it gently. The bruises are a blue that's nearly black in some places. It would take at least a month for this to go away. He wishes he'd bashed Nick's nose in. "You should end every day in better shape than when you woke up... not worse. This is... this is worse."

She tilts her head, her eyes grave. He would give anything to know what she was thinking as she stared at him. He had no idea what to say, so he says the obvious.

"Probably shouldn't take any more chems... I think this trip has been derailed."

Her laugh is weak, but it's there. Then she pulls him up off the floor. "Here. Sit down. Let me fix your hand now."

He hadn't even noticed he'd busted his knuckles open, to be honest. I guess repeatedly punching metal will do that to a person though. Nora uncorked the vodka bottle from beside the bedside manner, splashing it liberally. He swore, and she stuck her tongue out at him, just a little.

She began to wrap up his hand quite efficiently, she who once couldn't even put a bandaid on a person without missing. She'd come such a long way.

"He called you a junkie," she said quietly, keeping her eyes on his hand.

"Did he now? Pfff... not the first time. Always after me to clean my act up."

"He said you would lead me somewhere bad."

That was too close to the truth for him to comment on, so he winced in pretend pain instead as she tucked the end of his bandage in. "Any other pearls of wisdom he decided to bestow upon you?"

"...that you would leave me at some point."

"No." Hancock's voice is suddenly hard. "Don't even entertain that thought. You know I wouldn't."

She doesn't say anything.

"...Sunshine?"

"I think I'd just like all of this to go away," she says softly, and he's not sure if she's even talking to him anymore. "This... this was all probably such a mistake. I'm sorry Hancock."

He nods, and rises off the bed. "I'm just gonna get you some addictol. If you take it before you sleep, you'll avoid most of the rough stuff."

"Ok." She looks so tired, with remnants of cried off makeup drying on her cheeks. He remembers what it was like to kiss her, and he wishes he could kiss her now, but he realizes how terrible that idea is. In the bathroom, he splashes water on his face and reminds himself of who they both are.

He pulls out a box of various chems and located the addictol stash. He took a dose for himself, then a few fresh huffs of jet to keep him steady. She needed him to be steady.

When he comes back, she's under the covers, having swapped out her dress for an old shirt of his.

Fuck, he loves when she wears his things.

He holds out the inhaler and she takes it. He watched as she shook it a few times before bringing it to her mouth. She inhaled, and her eyes fluttered shut.

"Nora?"

"Yes?"

"You ok?"

"Mmm hmm... I just really like the way this one tingles."

When it was empty, she handed it back and he threw the empty into his trash can. Then he swallowed, not sure how to proceed.

"Uh... I can always crash on the couch, y'know. I don't know if you'd like some space after what happened or anything."

She shook her head. "No. Please? I was going to ask you if you would stay."

He's starting to wonder if being alone is Nora's new number one fear. No Shaun to worry about anymore, after all. Probably didn't matter who it was. Still, his shoulders lower in unspoken relief and he was quick to crawl in beside her, arms extending, folding her in his embrace. She settled against him, her breath tickling him just a little. He can feel her eyelashes catching on the cracked skin of his chest, and he exhaled a long breath he didn't even realize he'd been holding.

He was so close to being at peace.

Until a stray thought popped into his head.

How did Nora already know what addictol felt like?


	13. Keeping Her Head Above Water

Nora waited for nearly an hour, staring off in to the darkness, focusing on her breathing, keeping it deep and even.

Eventually she could tell from the rise and fall of Hancock's chest that he had fallen asleep. She also knew that while it was true did he didn't sleep for long periods of time, he did sleep like dead when it happened. She had outright dropped things on him to test her theory, which always made him laugh when she told him later on once he'd woken up.

Carefully she extracted herself from his arms, leaving the comfort of both him and his bed as she slipped away from the sheets. Her head whirled, just as it had been doing a lot recently. She knew she could fix it. She also knew she was having to fix it more and more often.

Nora wasn't stupid. The choices she were making, those were what was stupid, and she was aware that they were what was stupid, but she stood by them none the less. She knew she was messing with odds that could never be in her favour, but she also knew her life was already one that would not, in all probability, lead to old age. Why not spend time doing anything that would make her feel better? Hell, things had been pretty much been total misery up to this point anyway. It wasn't like she felt her life needed any prolonging.

Ugh. She could feel the spiral starting, coiling at the back of her neck.

In the living room she found her rucksack and brought it into what had once been quite a lovely bathroom. Rummaging through the inner pocket, she found exactly what she needed. Minutes later, she had plunged the syringe deep into her thigh, grimacing until the chem hit her system. God, there it was. The rush, the kick she needed to get her started. Once she started, she was always fine. Always.

* * *

It wasn't as if she'd simply woke up one day and just decided she would become a regular psycho user. She'd just been so tired of feeling miserable. Especially now, after learning how horrible the Institute really was... how Father had known all along she was frozen in a vault and only let her out as some kind of game. He'd never even expected that she would make it!

Sleep was impossible, food was inedible. The Railroad's plans had to be followed, but to go back to that... place and keep following Father's (not Shaun, never Shaun, not her Shaun) orders and doing God knows what further damage to the Commonwealth. Bringing down the Institute was important, but Father had to go down with the ship. She was starting to realize it would probably come down to her to provide that blow as well. Her hands were never clean these days.

Her thoughts had haunted her, and there was nobody she could turn to. This pain was as raw it could get, and not one person had been through something even close to her situation. She wouldn't have wanted them too. She'd rather suffer alone than bring anyone down to commiserate with. Besides, there was too much to do! There were settlers who were in need of new beds, water pumps that needed new filters... Surges and Preston did their best, but she was still their General, which meant much of the work was left to her. It almost reminded her of being already overwhelmed by the laundry pile only to have Nate pop his head in with a button that needed to be sewn.

Did she really have to do everything herself?

Cait was new to the settlement, but she had already decided she liked Nora. She'd come to bum a smoke, and the two had got to talking in the new Sanctuary bar. Nora had then been hiding vodka bottles in her drawers for weeks, but all the alcohol did was make her sadder. So she asked Cait for her opinions on the various chems she'd come across in her travels and with shiny, happy eyes, Cait told her all about pyscho.

Sure, she'd warned her it was a hard one to shake, but the pros had very much outweighed the cons. Nora had paid for both their drinks and kissed her cheeks goodbye before she wavered across the street and up into her house.

She made a drunken beeline to the room she used for storage, sure that Hancock had once left a bag of various party favours behind. She'd told him repeatedly to come and get them, but he'd only told her to consider it his new Sanctuary Stash, and appointed her as its keeper.

Surely the keeper got to have a cut of the goods, right?

She'd never forgotten how much lighter and brighter everything was for her that night. Possibilities seems endless. Negativity was forgotten. Her aching muscles and tired body? Re-energized and renewed.

She'd been a willing slave to it ever since.

* * *

Coming back down from the height of it, she pulled out a second dose of addictol and inhaled deeply, popping several knots along her spine. She was exhausted, and couldn't wait to get a Nuka into her system as well as her chems. She knew Hancock kept a supply for her somewhere, but her had was all fuzzy and she was sure she'd emptied it yesterday anyway.

Had it been yesterday? Time had lost all meaning to her, beyond what colour the sky was. Nora squinted out one of the dirty windows, guessing it to be almost sundown. How long had they been in the bar, anyway?

The addictol was working toward cleaning out her system, and she knew she'd be ready for travel in mere moments. She tossed the empty syringe on top of the other, threw some random garbage in after it. Not that she thought they wouldn't obviously find it there if they did look. She just liked to feel like she made an effort to hide. She turned on the rusted tap and drank deeply, erasing the taste of the medicine from her mouth.

Standing in front of the mirror, she pulled off her shirt and examined the lines of her bones. She made a face at herself. Maybe she did need to pay more attention to when she needed food. Not that she wanted to admit anything Nick had said was true.

Nick...

She ran her fingers over the wounds he'd inflicted on her. It was so out of character for him to act that way. He could run hot, sure, but he'd never, not once, had ever laid a hand on her, or really anyone who didn't deserve it. She'd had friends before the war, unfortunate friends, who'd had 'those' kinds of husbands. She knew the signs of abusive and this wasn't like that. There'd been nothing leading up to it. He'd never thrown anything, never struck an object beyond the occasional desk... Had he really just been so consumed with jealousy that something had snapped inside him? A blown circuit? Was that even possible?

"Nick, why did you do this?" she whispered as she traced the lines of the bruising, feeling how sore it was.

Shaking it off, she reached into the bottom of her pack and pulled out one of her many vault suits. She always took one with her, just in case. She'd gotten pretty good at improving her armour, and she needed to be light on her feet, no bulking armour to hold her down... plus, people just tended to be nicer to vault dwellers.

She dressed quickly, then pulled her hair back and scrubbed her face clean. She walked back into the living room and pulled her favourite leather jacket off the coat rack. It was Kellogg's old jacket, actually. She'd cut it down, and stitched it to fit her, too in love with the smell of leather to simply toss it aside.

She laced up her combat boots and then picked up her bag. It was time to go.

She paused in the door frame, and turned slightly, looking back towards Hancock's room. He'd wake up soon. He'd wake up to find himself in an empty bed and she knew he would panic. She took a moment to scribble down a short note of explanation, knowing if she wrote too much, she'd never leave. She left it on the coffee table, hoping he would find it sooner rather than later.

Her pack was light, but she knew she'd have to wait to get supplies. She planned to leave Goodneighbour as stealthily as she could, which meant a visit to Daisy's was out of the question, and Diamond City was now more dangerous than the Glowing Sea.

There was only one place for her to go.

It was time to go home.


	14. Twisted Wires

The first thing Nick did once he could talk again was tell Ellie to get out and find herself another job.

He locked the door behind her and turned off all the neon outside.

Then he'd stared into the mirror, hat tossed aside, shirt off, examining the damage that still needed to be fixed. Sure, it was great he never needed to worry about dying of thirst of blood lose, but he DID need to worry about oil shortages and lost limbs. He'd patched the worst of the torn wire that connected to his 'voice box', but others were still loose and there was one that sent a tearing shock of pain through him if he even brushed against it. His left shoulder, the shoulder Hancock had used to pull him away from Nora, was now broken somewhere deep inside, a gear pulled out of alignment, more wires that had been stretched beyond their capacity... Fixing this would take weeks, and that was with another person to reach the spots Nick couldn't.

 _guess the shoulder stays busted then... should have thought of that._

Nick growled, turning away from his reflection. Instead he looked down at the skeletal hand he hated so much. Under the harsh light, he could see there were still spots of blood that had dried in between the screws and the steel, and he felt as close to throwing up as a synth ever could.

Her blood.

He broke the mirror.

~

The days stretched into one week and then into two. He knew his silence probably wouldn't last much longer, and sure enough Piper turned up, banging on his door, yelling until she was horse, or until a DC guard forced her to quiet down. He figured she would eventually give up, or get distracted. He was wrong.

"Nick, you better be able to hear me in there! If I finally get in there and you're dead, I will reboot you and shut you down all over again!"

It had taken a long time for him to unlock the door.

When he managed to jerk it open, she'd jumped in surprise. "Nick? Nick, is that you?"

"Yeah..." he was already walking away, back to the back of the room.

"You don't... you don't sound right."

He coughed, almost, in a way. "Damaged." Sparks illuminated him briefly, somewhere to his left as he sat down heavily.

"Damaged!? Are you kidding me, Nick? If you need repairing, why didn't you just ask?" She pushed past the only somewhat open door and squinted into the gloom of the agency. "Do you just sit in the dark whenever you're alone? Is this some kind of synth thing? Because if it is- Jesus, Nick!"

She had turned the lights back on.

Nick was slumped backward in the chair, his hat off and chest bare. He wore nothing but his slacks, and his eyes looked straight ahead, the light almost flickering. Piper had never seen him unclothed like him, and she was willing to bet few people ever did. Nick didn't hide what he was, but he didn't go around advertising it either. She'd always thought of him as just plain Nick, but now, without the cloth to distract he she was suddenly all too aware of how much Nick looked like all the never-even-named synths that she'd gunned down during the fall of the Institute.

"Oh, Nick... What happened?" She crouched by his side, laying a hand gently on his arm. He didn't react in any way. There was no real expression on his face either. Just a blank slate, empty of anything.

"Diagnostics running."

"Nick, c'mon, you don't need to pull that with me."

"Diagnostics running."

His voice was hollow. Piper didn't like it.

"Who did this to you? Was it someone you met on the road? Some kind of anti-synth gang or something? Your arm socket, it's... I mean, yeah, your shoulder should not look like that, ok? I'm not even a tech person and I know that! Who can I get that can repair you? Sturges is pretty good with everything, even electrical. But if you have any damage that needs a specialist-"

"Amari."

She blinked. "What?"

"Amari."

"As in Doctor Amari?"

"Amari."

"These one word answers are really starting to give me the creeps, Nick."

He didn't respond.

She rose back up, sighing. "Ok. I'm going to go out on a limb and assume you need Doctor Amari for some reason as she is the only person named Amari that I have ever heard of. I will also assume you're somehow immobilized in one way or another because otherwise I'm sure you would already be getting checked out."

Nick's head tuned back to stare at the desk he sat behind.

"I mean, I can go and get her, I can! I just don't know how much good she'll be. Don't get me wrong, she's stupid smart, but wouldn't someone with a... I dunno, a robotics background or something?"

His eyes dimmed. Piper suddenly felt very anxious.

"Ok, Ok... I get the message. I'll get her for you. You just... sit tight."

~

Piper hadn't gotten two steps into Goodneighbour before there were Triggermen in her face.

"Hey, reporter! You're on the list."

"List? What list? I don't even cover GN anymore, you guys know that. It's too hard to tell what actually counts as crime here."

"Hancock's new list. Anyone who's consorted with that Vaultie of his? He wants them in his office, first thing, soon as they come through the gates."

Piper's brows arched. "Of his?" she repeated.

The guard shrugged. "I call 'em like I see 'em."

"Yeah, well, I'm kind of on a deadline here, y'know? No time for side trips."

"You want Hancock mad at you? Be my guest. Don't check in."

She rolled her eyes as she passed by them, and then passed by the Statehouse door. "Oh no! I'm not reporting in! I'm such a rebel!"

"Always a pleasure, Pipes. Love when you visit!"

"You know it's mutual." She stuck out her tongue out at him as she rounded the corner, heading straight to the Memory Den.

~

"You want me to go back with you to Diamond City? Are you joking?"

"C'mon Doc... this is for Nick! He's in rough shape, worse than I've ever seen him in. Whatever hit him had real firepower. He's... sparking, for God's sake!"

"And he requested me specifically?"

"Unless Amari is a more popular name that I thought, yeah. He wants you to take a look."

Dr. Amari frowned. "I don't understand. I wouldn't be of much help, not if his issues are technological. My field of work is the human brain, I couldn't be any less suited to repairing a one-off synth model."

Piper's brow furrowed. She was getting the same itchy palms she always did when she could feel a story brewing. "I thought you were his regular doctor for robot stuff."

"Not at all. What on earth gave you that impression?"

"Well, you were the one who looked him over before though, right? To get those memories for Nora, so she could look for Shaun?"

"Well, of course, but that was a special situation. Nick was generous enough to loan his body and brain, of sorts, so that we could install Kellogg's augmenter and scan his memories for clues as to where he might have taken her son."

She watched Piper's jaw drop.

"Kellogg's augmenter?" The reporter's knees now felt like they were full of cold water; also a sign that something big was becoming uncovered... but not anything good. "You're telling me that you had a piece of the asshole who murdered Nora's husband, and stole her baby, and essentially ruined her life?"

"Yes."

"And that this part came from his still-warm corpse, which Nora had killed herself?"

"I believe that was its origin, yes."

"And then Nick was all, 'Sure, just stick it in my head?!'"

"Piper, you weren't there-"

How could you allow that to happen?!"

"There were no other options! I cautioned him against it, but you know Nick Valentine. He was willing to take that risk if it helped Nora and her son. He wanted to help. He needs to help. The side effects could have been enormous, but there were only a few leftover impressions. I was very careful, and I scanned him quite thoroughly afterward."

A very bad thought was screaming inside Piper's head.

"Impressions? Leftover impressions? Are you saying Kellogg was loose inside Nick's head?"

"Only for a moment, and it wasn't exactly him-"

"How do you know that?!" Piper's face was as red as her jacket. "He's been sitting in a dark room for two weeks, broken, probably on some kind of stand-by mode-" She stopped short, and her face drained of colour entirely. "Oh my God. Oh my God. Of course!" She started to laugh, high and brittle, the surprise almost too much for her. Dr. Armari looked at her as if she'd lost her mind.

"Piper, are you all right?"

"No," she managed to get out, the laughter dying down as panic hit and hit hard. "I'm not, but that's not important. It's Nick we need to worry about... God, we should have realized!"

"Realized what?"

"Kellogg. It's Kellogg!"

"I have no idea what you-"

"It makes total sense! Kellogg is still in there and he's trying to take control over Nick! Maybe he knew how to hide from your scans, it doesn't matter, we have to go help him! He's fighting him off, probably even right now! That's why he sounds wrong, and that's why he hurt Nora, and Oh My God, that's why he won't admit he loves her, because Kellogg wants to hurt her and Nick would never put her in that danger and we need to go, we need to go now!"

The Doctor barely had time to pack a bag.


	15. A Surprising Visitor,A Welcome Distracti

It was late in Sanctuary.

Nora was sitting on her porch, head back, trying to lose herself in the stars. It wasn't hard to do; she'd taken an astronomy course in university as an elective in her second year. It had ended up to be too much math for her to be great at it, but now she could recall nearly every constellation she'd been taught, no matter how briefly. Not only that, she could also identify them all, sitting there in the sky above her, so far away.

How had she lived so long without realizing that mentats were this amazing? It was so nice to have her thoughts focused, to keep them from just floating around and bumping into topics that were nothing but painful.

Shaun.

Nate.

Nick.

That time she had to slaughter unsuspecting scientists.

That time she had to murder that nice little Brotherhood Scribe.

That time she had to blow up an airship filled with more unsuspecting members of the Brotherhood.

That time she'd had to blow up the Insti-

Nope. Nope. Nope.

Oh look, there was Pegasus.

Then there was a boom from behind her, shaking the earth under her chair, shattering her piece of mind. "Jesus Christ, are you kidding me!?' Shooting to her feet, she stomped around her house, narrowing her eyes at the plume of smoke that was rising not very far from their lovely, little settlement.

"General?"

"I've already got eyes on it, Preston." Did the man ever sleep? Or was he always lurking behind her, ready to spring trouble on her the second he could. "Let me just grab my pistol. I'm sure it's nothing."

"Would you like me to come along?"

She bit the inside of her cheek, suppressing the eye roll she felt building up. Traveling with goody-toe shoes Preston was not her idea of a great time. "Nah, don't worry. I think it's just that train again. I need to move that stupid Power Armour away from it. It attracts Raiders like catnip."

"Catnip?" Preston looked so adorable when he was bewildered.

"Listen, how about I tell you when I get back? For now, you just keep your eye on the perimeter there, just in case."

Dogmeat had barked from a nearby hill, sensing a chance to run. He was at her side and stood still as she strapped on his specially made armour and helmet. She outfitted herself similarly, grabbed a few of her fave guns, and then slid a random box of chems inside her back for good measure.

You know, just in case.

* * *

Nora had been right in assuming it was the train yard again. Someone had sprinkled various landmines around it, saving it for later, marking it as their territory.

"Well, too bad for you cause I say otherwise," she muttered to herself as she disarmed her fourth, packing it up for resale later on. The cause of the initial explosion was a poor radstag who'd wandered into the path without even realizing it.

At least dinner was taken care of.

She was just finishing up her butchery when a twig snapped behind her. Instantly, her gun was out, but a strong hand came out of nowhere, wrapping round the barrel, pushing it away before she could fire. Another arm was suddenly around her waist, pulling her hard against someone's chest. Panic welled inside her. Was this finally it?

Then the voice spoke, low and lazy, directly into her ear."Well, hello there, Killer. Fancy bumping into you like this."

Pickman.

Fabulous.

"I'm not a threat to you," she said softly, meaning it.

"Never crossed my mind." He released her, gun first, and she took a few steps back before facing him. He looked almost sad. "Don't think it did."

Nora hadn't killed Pickman when she'd stumbled into his 'gallery', as he called it. Hancock had sent her to investigate, and that she did, stumbling on a man about to face a group of furious raiders. Killing them was almost instinct by that point, and when the dust had settled and the blood had soaked in, the two of them had just stared at one another for a moment or two.

He'd looked so normal... for a serial killer.

But he hadn't killed her, hadn't murdered anyone who didn't deserve it, not in her eyes. If raiders were given the chance, they would take the entire Commonwealth by force of the cruelest kind. She knew that. She'd experienced it. Why should she care what happened to them?

Besides, she sorta liked the art.

"You've gotten an awful lot of blood on that pretty jacket of yours. Shame. At least it's leather. Should wash off easily enough. My suits are sometimes impossible to clean."

She sorta liked his voice too. There was something strangely calming about Pickman.

"You look tired."

"I am," she answered, surprised at her own honesty. Then again, weren't serial killers supposed to be exceptionally charismatic?

"I hear you've been through a lot. I swung up this way to catch myself a new subject or two, but I must admit... that Travis fellow has been talking nonstop about your exploits. I figured if half of it was true-"

"All of it is true."

He whistled, a single note. "And yet you manage to continue."

Nora considered. "I suppose that's true."

"Most people would have been driven mad by all you've seen.. all you've done. I bet you have beautiful art lock up inside you, just waiting to spill out."

"Pickman..."

He took a step closer. "I know I said I worked alone, and I do... but my studio can get so lonely... there's space there I could share...a canvas or two that I can spare."

Nora swallowed. "Look, I know I've been through a lot of shit, yes, but I don't need to just go and become a murderer."

"Whose talking about murder? I'm talking about art." He was watching her, but there were no alarms going on in her head. He took another step. "Didn't you ever take an art class in school?"

"Of course not. There's no money in art."

Pickman threw his head back and laughed. "Thank God we live in a world with traditional careers... traditional expectations..." His eyes dropped to her wrist. "You've been injured by someone. Bruising... why have you not treated it?"

"I... I don't know how?"

"Bruises are not difficult, so long as you know what plants can help. I earn a lot of bruises in my line of work. I do not like to have my body marked by those savages... not for any longer than necessary. If you come with me, I can give you some."

Nora snorted a laugh of her own. "And I won't end up a head on a stick?"

"Technically, it would be a pike. I would never hurt you, Killer. You're a work of art just by existing. To kill you would be to kill pure beauty."

Who could argue with that?


	16. Breathe Deep, Don't Mind the Paint Fumes

"Why do you know so much about plants and medicine?" Nora hadn't expected to feel the effects of Pickman's salve so quickly, but she could feel a refresh tingle as it soaked into her skin. "Is there mint in this?"

"It probably began as mint, once upon a time. To answer your first question, I read up about it, or discovered it through trail and error. I collect a lot of wild plant life, you see.. tree bark too, the occasional bug carcass... anything really."

She had to admit, she was impressed. "Of course. You make your own paint, don't you?"

"It was that, or make everything blue and yellow." He finished wrapping her wrist and tucked his supplies back into the beat-up doctor's bag. "You don't need to keep it wrapped longer than overnight, but do leave it alone until then."

"I will. Thank you."

"No need for thanks. I saw you needed something I had, and so I offered."

He went to put the bag back, and Nora was left alone for a few minutes. She stared at her new bandage and wondered why she felt so at ease. Pickman was vicious. Pickman was legendary. Pickman was sick.

Pickman had also not once imposed on her, outside of a bloody heart drawing here and there. Where Nick had made he feel needed, and Hancock had made her feel wanted, Pickman made her feel nothing. He simply was; an outlier in every way.

Perhaps she was too... not that she wanted to think about it.

Coming back into the room, Pickman glanced at the dim light sneaking through the holes in his curtains. "There's still a few hours for me to hunt. It's early, but not early enough. Don't feel you need to leave. In fact, feel free to stay. This is probably one of the safest spots in the entire Commonwealth, given my reputation, and I think you could use a real, true rest."

The tingling around her wrist was pleasant... and she was honestly so tired, she could have cried.

Pickman directed her to his spare bedroom, offered clothes for her sleep in as well. She closed the door behind her, and listened to his footsteps fade down the staircase. She shed her own clothing quickly, eager to away from their grime. Then she pulled the oversized grey shirt around her before sinking into the softest, cleanest bed she'd slept in in a long, long time.

If this was how she was going to die, then so be it.

* * *

It was early evening when Nora woke up. She stared at the ceiling above her, breathing in and out. Her head was spinning and it took a moment to remember where she was. She sat up slowly, assessing her body. She'd been trying hard to be a good girl these last few days, to keep the pyscho to a minimum, to ignore it when it got needy. Still, just a little in the morning, that was fine, right? A jump start was fine. Just one. Like vitamins. Right?

Too bad it wasn't meant to be. Rummaging in her pack, she realized she'd grabbed a chem box with only low grade chems. Not a syringe to be seen.

Rolling her sleeve back down, she cursed under her breath. The house seemed still, quiet... Was Pickman still out? She noticed that her jacket was no longer puddled on the ground, but hanging on the back of a chair, cleaned of all blood splatters. Had he snuck in to do her laundry? No, the rest of her clothes had been untouched.

She checked her pockets and found her cigarettes and mentats in their usual places. Letting out a small sigh of relief, she slid open the tin and wondered how many to take. Shit, she had way too many of the orange ones left. Nora had come to favour the grape variety, especially as they turned out to be quite useful for helping her evade difficult conversations, but she was running low... Really, it wasn't a surprise. People were always asking about how she was doing, or what she had planned for the future, or what happened to the railway or did she ever find her son...

She took three. And then two. And was about to take one, when there was a knock on the door frame. "Killer?"

Nora snapped the tin shut, sliding it away between the sheets, taking her hands away like it had burned her. "Yes?" She turned to Pickman quickly, not quite she what she was doing or why she was hiding anything from him. She barely knew him. Why did she care what he thought of her? She had no need to hide. She had no reason to feel guilt.

But God she did, she did.

"I wanted to let you know I'm going to be downstairs in the studio and... Killer? Are you all right?"

The lack of psycho was starting to really push down hard on her... She swallowed, trying to pop her ears. Everything was a bit fuzzy. She was way too sober. "Me? All right? Of course I am."

"Are you lying?"

"Of course I am."

"Do you often lie?" he asked

"All the time," she admitted.

And didn't she have plenty of reasons?

What was she supposed to do? She didn't deserve sympathy, but she couldn't tell anyone why. They could never know. She could never admit it... She could never find words to describe just how many people she had murdered, in so many various ways... gunned down in cold blood, or torn apart by shrapnel, or suffocated in an airless room, or burned alive amidst the wreckage.. How many innocent victims had she taken down and blown up and how many of those scientists had families and how many scribes had children and speaking of children, what about that one child, that synth child, her synth ch-

Why couldn't she breath correctly all of a sudden? Why had the room tilted? Why was she falling?

Why?

"Killer? Killer? Come back to me, Killer." There was pressure on her cheek, under her jaw, her head was being titled, her lungs were struggling, her throat closing. "Killer? No... Nora. Nora, I need you to listen to me carefully. I need you to focus on my voice, all right?"

She could do that.

"Nora, listen. Nora, I need to you let me know that you can hear me. If you can't talk, that's all right. But I have to know that you can at least hear me. So nod if you can, blink twice... something like that, ok?"

She nodded and he smiled. It was really more of a smirk, but it was still nice, somehow.

"You're having what's called a panic attack. Maybe you already know that, but if you don't, that's what it is. I used to get them too... before I channeled myself into the art. I know you're terrified right now, but you will survive this. You'll hit a peak, if you haven't already, and then you'll start to come down, and then you'll feel weak, and foolish, but you are not. Not either one. Not you.

Just follow my directions. I'll guide you through this." 

* * *

"Thank you," she whispered to him, when the worst was finally over and she could raise her head from the floor and breathe like a regular person again

Pickman stared down at her, still cradling her cheek. Gently, he brushed her sweaty hair back from her brow, tilted her face towards the light.

"You have been through so much... God, I can't begin to imagine. Nora... Nora... I know what anguish looks like. I see my reflection in it almost twice a week, in the eyes of those I work with... I have watched the light fade from the faces of countless raiders. I've drained their lives away, drop by agonizing drop. I have created pain and suffering, and I have inspired despair and misery, and I feel I have captured so much, so perfectly and yet...

...and yet your eyes. Oh, Nora. ...if only I could paint your eyes."


	17. Temperature Rising

Hancock was frustrated beyond words. He had no idea what had happened to Nora. Her note had been so vague that he'd convinced himself she was mad at him. Maybe for interrupting things with her and Nick? Well, what was he supposed to have done then? Let him squeeze her damn hand off?

Not gonna happen.

He spent two days blowing this theory up in inside his head, but later realized that was really more the whiskey talking. By the time he switched from liquids to smoke he realized how stupid he was being, that she probably just needed space, why would he assume the worst? Time could heal all wounds. couldn't it?

By the time the third week rolled around, Hancock was struggling to keep his cool. He read and reread her note until he knew it better than his own past. He found no secret codes, so hidden messages. All that she had written was that she needed to go home and she needed to think. She hadn't directly asked him to stay away, but hadn't asked him to find her either. There was no hint of a timeline, nothing he could chart or look for... it was driving him crazy.

He missed her so fucking much.

Home. Sanctuary. He tried to picture her there, imagine what she was doing. He couldn't, of course. Any time he tried to imagine her doing anything, it always ended up back in his bedroom, his fingers on her shirt buttons, that shy smile on her face as she looked up at him, the way he could feel her voice vibrate under the skin of her throat-

"FUCK!"

He broke yet another bottle against the wall.

There was a pause and then he winced as he heard an exasperated sigh and something being tossed aside in the room next door. He'd finally done it. He'd finally woken the bear with his bullshit.

Fahrenheit, the only person in the entire Commonwealth that could scare John Hancock, appeared in his doorway. He started to apologize for the noise, but enough was enough.

"If you're this strung out about it, just go and fucking see her! She never said you couldn't. She never said you shouldn't. So go get your damn girl and please give me some peace and quiet for at LEAST seventy-two hours, or so help me, Boss. I'll not only give up on being your bodyguard, I will ADVERTISE it."

"Fahr, c'mon-"

"Don't you even try! You're usually a pain to look after even on your best behaviour, but these past two weeks have been excruciating. I've pulled you out of four bar fights, two outside-the-bar fights and bought you more chems than the past two months combined! This is NOT continuing! Get your ass to Sanctuary and maybe try sobering up a little. Even for you, you're a complete mess right now."

She was right, that was the worst part. She was totally right.

But what else was he supposed to do? What else did he know? He sure as shit didn't know a damn thing about love, not about falling in it, or getting out of it, and he haaaaaaated every bit of it. Chems, chems and fights, those he knew...

Nora.

He had been so sure he knew Nora.

Maybe a visit to her place wouldn't be that intrusive... it had been such a long, long, long time, after all.

Besides, how long could it really take to get there on his own?

* * *

It took an eternity.

He'd run out of jet two thirds into the trip, and withdrawal is a bitch. Man, he really had been hitting things too hard, even for him. His head throbbed, and his vision had been blurry for most of the last leg. He was so happy to finally spot the weathered, cheery Welcome sign, that he could have hugged Preston as he called out from across the bridge.

Well, up until he spoke.

"What do you mean, she's not here?!"

Preston sighed. "I mean exactly what I said, Hancock. She's not here. "

Hancock rubbed both his eyes with the heels of his palms. Ok. Great. Not here. Shit. She didn't swing by on her way to somewhere else? Maybe mention to you where she was going?"

"She was here up until a few days ago. Then she went to check on an explosion. Haven't seen her since."

"You have got to be fucking kidding me."

"Nope."

"She left because there was an explosion, didn't come back, and you're OK with that?"

"If you think I let even one one hour go by without sending a patrol after her, I really don't know what to tell you. She's our General, man, come on."

"And they reported no dead Nora, all must be well, let's all move on?"

"No sign of Nora, no sign of trouble. Dogmeat is still here in town, calm as can be. You know he'd lose it if she was in any serious danger. He always knows. Somehow. "

Hancock did have to admit that was true. The dog had a gift.

He managed a begrudging nod.

"And besides," continued Preston, "She's a grown woman. A woman who just went through hell and back. After all she's done for us, she deserves some privacy, some room to breathe... I've seen it before, when people take on too much, see too much... The stress, or the trauma, whatever it is? It gets to them. It's getting to her." He looked over both shoulders to make sure nobody was paying them any attention, then leaned in slightly, his voice dropping. "She's not sleeping normally anymore, you know that? She spent every night that she was here smoking on her porch, and every day shut up at home. Most people don't even know she was here. Don't get me wrong, I have full confidence in her. She's always found away to push forward but now that there's no reason for her to keep going... "

Hancock didn't like how that sounded. "She could have reasons."

"I wouldn't know... We weren't ever that close, and now that she's been gone so long? I feel like I can't catch up. Besides," Preston added, as he shouldered his laser rifle and got ready to get back to work. "It seems to me that Nora currently has plenty of people already watching out for her. Safe travels, Hancock." He gave the ghoul a wave as he turned and walked away.

Wait a second.

'Plenty of People?'

What the fuck had that meant?

Ugh... Garvey.

Maybe he wasn't as dumb as Hancock had assumed.


	18. Some Things You Need to Know

Nick Valentine had a battle going on inside his head.

Literally.

 _I'm getting stronger, Nicky. Y'know what that means? It means you're getting weaker_

He'd been struggling with Kellogg for longer than he wanted to admit. He'd believed the good Doctor's diagnosis of mnemonic impression and hadn't lost slept over it for very long. For several months, everything was fine. There's only been that one scare back in the beginning, nothing else, not for any reason.

Until he started to realize his affection for Nora.

That was when the voice came back, just a muttering that became clearer over time. He wrote it off as doubt, as stress, and tried to ignore both problems.

Of course, that didn't work.

As his feelings for her grew, so too did the voice in the back of his head. It was there whenever his hopes over her rose, telling him every single reason to doubt himself, to doubt that he could be enough for her. It came and went, and he soon got used to tuning it out.

Until the day the words sharpened.

* * *

It had been a month since the discovery of the Institute's location. Nora had spent most of that time deep underground, trying to form some sort of relationship with the son she had lost. What kind of bond they could cobble together, he wasn't fully certain. Shaun had been a newborn when he'd been stolen, and now he had a good forty years on his own mother.

The Commonwealth. Always discovering new and innovative ways to be terrible.

Not even in the pulpiest of pulp would you find this sort of plot twist. He had no advice to give, no experience with this kind of situation. Nobody did. It was yet another horrific road that Nora was forced to walk down alone. He had offered to be there whenever she needed him, and she promised she would check in.

A promise she kept.

Every second or third day, there she was, sitting in the chair across from him, telling him all about the incredible things they were doing down there. She never brought up Shaun, and neither did he. Instead she told him about the different people who lived and worked there, all the scientists and their various tasks. She was fascinated by their technology, bamboozled by the underground trees, it was all like magic to her. Occasionally she would bring him presents, mostly proper packages of cigarette, and once a square of cloth so he could really see the colour white again, not the faded, always-too-yellow white that existed now. Her stories grew more detailed and she did more than a capable job of telling them. Everything was fascinating.

Well, up until it became terrifying.

* * *

It was those damn gorillas that set it all off.

Nora had been telling him all about the incredible science lab that had not one, but two gorillas, kept in a forested tank of sorts. "Not real of course," she hastily explained. They were a first attempt at creating synthetic animals, bringing back the species that had been wiped out when the bombs fell.. From the sounds of it, it was turning out to be quite the success. As she told him the details, Nick realized the full extent of what the Institute could be capable of. That kind of ability, to just create life out of nothing...

"What exactly are they planning to do with these creatures? Start up the world's largest underground zoo?"

"They won't tell me that kind of thing, unfortunately. Maybe it's a kind of reverse Noah's Ark? Maybe they'll make two of everything and plop them back down on the surface."

"Makes a person wonder if they've also got a flood planned to wipe the slate clean first."

The atmosphere in the office shifted. Inside his head, he cursed. He'd gone too far with that one.

"I don't think they would do that, Nick." Her tone hadn't gone icy, exactly, but she was defiantly using her lawyer voice.

He knew this was sensitive ground, but he also knew Nora had to address the elephant in the room at some point. Everything around them, every faction, he guessed you could call them, were escalating in their expectations for the world around them. Sooner or later, something was going to snap.

"Nora... they kidnap people. They deny others, others like me, our basic rights because we happened to be something they built. I know he's your son, but-"

"Nick, you know I don't want to hear this."

"Sweetheart, do you think I want to rain on your parade? I don't. I wish you and Shaun could be a true family, and that he would realize the surface isn't as crappy as he makes it out to be. I wish there was a way they could apologize for everything they've done up here, and that we could all be pals, hand in hand, the whole damn dance number!

But they can't. There is just no way... Nora, there's just so much they've caused that you don't know about or understand. Not as someone just waking up to the chaos of this world. Especially not as a member of a race with unquestioned free will.'

He'd honestly expected her to cry. But she didn't.

So he kept talking.

"The Commonwealth was having enough trouble stringing a life together with what they had. Now we have the Brotherhood dropping in above us, and the Institute creeping in from below. The future for me doesn't look all that bright these days. I've got you and the minuteman to stick up for me and my kind, and that Railroad group seems to be on the level, if they even exist at all. But you and I both know that when it comes to the big guns, we're outnumbered. They'll come for us eventually. What they'll do exactly, or who'll be the first to drop the hammer, I don't know. But it won't be good. I do know that.

Especially if it happens to be the Institute... they find out a prototype like me escaped their scrap heap? An example of things they did incorrectly? They'd snuff me the first chance they could get."

"I would never let that happen." The hands that had been trembling in her lap are steady now as she takes his good hand between them. "I swear to you Nick. I'm not... I'm not just ignoring what's under this rock, I know it's bad... it's really bad. But I can't turn my back yet, not when I've done so much to get to him. There are pieces there that I'm still fitting together. Maybe with time... I just need a chance to really sit down with him, explain that thing here aren't so bad. That they can be better than he thinks."

"I just don't think-"

She cut him off with the squeeze of her hand. "Please, Nick? He's still my son. Just a little bit more time. That's all we'll need."

He sighed.

The silence around them deepened, and he tapped out a fresh smoke.

Nora watched the movement of his fingers as he flicked open his lighter, and held it steady as he breathed in. The light reflected off the bits and pieces of exposed metal. He exhaled, and met her eyes with his.

"I tried to tell him," she blurted out. "I tried to tell Shaun about Curie, and Glory, and you. I wanted him to see you're not just steel and bolts. That I had people I could count on, that I could care about. I though if he knew his own mother had worked beside and made friends with synths, it could.. I don't know. Change his perspective? "

"You did, hm? What'd he have to say to that?"

Her shoulder slumped as she recalled his exact words. "He told me it was impossible to be friends with a machine."

There was so much defeat in her tiny voice.

He'd taken the barely smoked cigarette from between his lips, and offered it to her. Nora took it gratefully.

Then he changed the subject, asked her what animals she missed the most from the past.

Her other hand had remained, tight around his, for the rest of her visit.


	19. Conversations with One

_You're not giving me a sporting chance here, Nick._

Nick grimaced. The voice was almost too loud now. It was causing a vibration inside his skull that made him him grit in teeth in the face of such growing pain. His head was bowed under the effort, hands both resting palms up on the desk in front of him. No matter what impulse raced through him, he fought it. There were deep gouges in the wood around his bad hand, and the skin of his left hand was beginning to tear.

Kellogg was calling most the shots inside him, had been for a few hours now. It started out small, the twitch of a finger, the turn of his wrist. It hadn't taken long for Kellogg to make his way around the broken circuits, taking control of him and putting Nick into a fist fight against himself. Nick had managed to dodge one of the punches to his own face, but missed the second. He had to admit, he had a mean right hook.

 _This really is nice... It feels good to hit something again. I think I've started going stir crazy up here with so little to do. Been a long time since I've been stuck in one place like this. That bar fight you got yourself into, that had been the first fun I've had in months! And you had to go and shut me out, keep me away from landing one hit! That wasn't very nice of you Nicky._

"What the hell is wrong with you? All this time, you stay silent in my head, just sitting there while I live my life? Have you always just been there!?"

 _Has to be a record, right?. You're the detective. Ever find a longer long con?_

"So why pop up and start making me doubt my sanity? Why this game of control? What's your end game, Kellogg?"

 _Fun? I mean, that's where it started, gotta be honest... See, I was just going to bide my time until I had the chance to contact the Institute, or for them to figure out what happened to me. Once they knew where I was, they could pick me up and take me back to a new body all my own. 'Bout time for it, too. I was really more synth than man by the time that damned woman of yours blew my brains out._

 _However, it's now only a matter of time before that goody two-shoes realizes she's gotta blow the place sky high to 'protect the innocents above ground' or some other garbage nonsense. I blame you for that, Nicky. You kept her all squeaky clean, all obsessed with doing 'the right thing.' Shame she didn't spend more time with that ghoul earlier. He'd have had her see how dark the grey can get, in between all the black and white you try to stick by._

"Don't talk about her."

 _You'd rather I go back to jerking you around? Or should we stay here and wait? I can just play dead again for ol' Amari, go back to hiding... the possibilities are endless. Oh wait, no. No, they aren't. They were, but that was before my time for pick-up got an expiry date slapped across it!_

Nick's left hand jerked hard, but he was ready. Gears inside him were grinding, and he could feel springs loosen, but he wasn't letting his hand leave the desk. The edges of the steel frame bit into the wood, scrapping as he tried to keep himself still. Then as quickly as it came, it was done. The pressure released, and Nick sagged forward in response.

He really didn't have much more in him.

 _Getting tired out there, Nicky? Me too, actually. Whatever power I'm absorbing, I'm running low... Yeah... I might have to go back to silence after this... build up my strength, now that I know what I've got._

"Until when?"

 _Until I get the chance to slaughter your sparrow before she blows up my cage!_

His rage boomed inside the synth, causing Nick to groan in response. "Please... There has to be a way we can work this out. Why don't I just tell Nora and she-"

With an almighty bang, his forehead slammed into the table. It was as if someone had snuck up behind him and shoved, but he knew the motion came from the inside, not the out. There was a terrible ringing in his ears, and he realized with a shock that his breathing tubes felt as if someone was beginning to pinch them closed. Kellogg's fury was rising hot in his chest, along side the panic that was all his own.

 _I am not going to beg at the shrine of the bitch who put a bullet into my head, thank you very much._ The merc's voice sounded as if he was right beside Nick, hissing into both his ears somehow simultaneously. _I'm going to kill her for killing me, and you had better pray I have the chance to do it before she gets to the Institute._

The invisible hand holding him down vanished, along with the fingers inside his throat. Nick coughed, struggling to regulate his breath, to shake the blur from his vision. The tenseness inside him was gone as well, and he had once again had full control of himself. But that damn voice was still there, still low, still angry.

 _I promise you, Nick Valentine. If I end up trapped inside your body for the rest of my life, I will take your lovely Nora and I will break her with your own two hands._


	20. Posing Comes So Naturally

The sheet draped over her shoulders smelled of ancient perfume, one she recognized, but couldn't quite place Nora inhaled deeply, trying to match it to a memory. It seemed so familiar, perhaps something a neighbour or friend wore way back when...

Just over one entire distant year ago...

Wait, over a year?

Good Lord, had she forgotten Christmas?

"If you like the scent, the original bottle is rattling around in a drawer upstairs. You're welcome to it."

Pickman knelt at her feet, brushing the ground around her with rich red blood, letting it soak into the hem of the second sheet they had wrapped around her body. Rusty safety pins kept it together in the back, a jumbled mess of wrinkles and exposed skin, but the front looked smooth and crisp, falling in similar lines to that of a proper dress from long ago. He looked up at her and smiled.

He had a nice smile.

Nora raised her eyebrows, impressed. "You don't miss a thing, do you? Did you hear me breathing in? Or do you just read minds?"

"I find that those of us cursed with an artist streak are often skilled when it comes to observation.. unusually so, in some cases." He stood up, his can of "paint" held carefully in one hand. He dripped a smaller brush into it this time and carefully began to splatter it across the front of her dress. Nora watched, fascinated by the process.

"Should I move at all?"

"I'll need you to now, yes... You won't mind being splashed, correct? Good. Can you just put your arms out first? No, not like that... like.. Killer, please? I need your arms turned out... It's all right. This isn't a portrait of you. I just need you to stand in for the center figure. I won't paint it, I swear to you. Nobody will know."

* * *

The secrets nestled inside the crook of Nora's arm had burned with more than irritation and withdrawal... Pickman would notice her shaking and sweating, sooner or later. And then what would happen? Hancock had offered sympathy and she knew Nick would have given scorn, but what would a serial killer with a creative bent think about serious chem use? She had been worried Pickman would no longer look at her with light in his eyes once he saw she wasn't perfect, that she was weak and struggling...

Then he'd called her name from the front door, a box of supplies in his hands. Was she busy? Could she help him with a project? He'd had a sudden inspiration, but he needed a model for parts of it. Would Nora mind?

Mind? Ha! Tired of pacing the hallways and counting down the psycho-free minutes around her, Nora had jumped at the chance for something to distract her. It wasn't until he had asked her to change that she had dropped her gaze to the floor, not been sure what to do.. Should she make up an excuse? Come up with a lie? It suddenly seemed exhausting, the double life she'd led for so long.

So she told him.

She told him and he hadn't even blinked.

There had been no words of comfort, no silent stares of judgement. Instead he offered her access to a large bag in which he kept all the chems and meds he stripped from his subjects over the past few months. "Addictol can be rare outside these walls, but inside? Almost as plentiful as stimpacks. Would you like some before we begin?"

She'd been unable to stop herself from hugging him.

* * *

There was something in the way he touched her skin that reminded her of a doctor. His fascination with her was textbook, clinical. There was not a scrap of romance or sexual interest to be found. He was entirely focused on what she represented, on the image in his head that he was ready to commit to paper.

"Have you ever been a model before?"

"No, never... just something else to add to my resume, I suppose. Lawyer, Mother, Model, Murderer."

"You're hardly a murderer, Killer."

"You don't know that."

Something in her tone brought his focus to her face. "You're right. I don't. I apologize for assuming."

She straightened her shoulders under the sheet. "I guess it is hard to see though, isn't it? Nobody expects the housewife, I suppose..."

"There's a lot in that statement that's hard to see." He stepped back, examining his work so far. "I think that's enough red... if I add just a bit more, no, no... I can always paint in extra, I don't want to go too far in reality. Yes. I think it's time."

"Am I ready?"

"You? Of course. Me? I can only hope. Let me get my brushes."

* * *

It had been roughly an hour before he spoke again.

"You yell names in your sleep. Did you know that?"

"I... Yes. People have told me that before." She tried to speak without moving her lips.

"Would you like me to wake you should I overhear you again? It's no both-"

"You don't need to."

He poked his head out from his canvas to gaze at her in frank curiosity. She gave up on trying to keep still and shook her head at him. "You really don't. Whatever causes me to shout, I don't know what it is. I don't remember the, I dunno, dreams or nightmares or whatever they are... I don't know why I do it. No memories as to why. So you don't need to wake me, unless I'm being super loud and bothering you. of course."

He nodded and returned his focus to his painting The sound of him mixing colours together was surprisingly soothing, and she felt herself begin to relax a bit. It was nice, to feel her shoulders give just a little bit. She took a deep breath in and sighed. She could still feel the warming buzz of the cleaner chem deep inside her chest, and her thoughts were still just hazy enough to be comfortable inside her head. She was actually starting to feel balanced, which was both exciting and terrifying. How long would it last this time? How long until something new went horribly wrong?

Pickman started to hum a song much, much older than he was.

She smiled and hummed along.

Harmony.


	21. When Nobody is Right

The front door opened and closed. Nora wasn't alone anymore. She sighed softly in confused, but much appreciated relief. The day had been long, and the light was fading out; books wouldn't be of much use for much longer.

"Killer? Where are you?"

She hadn't been intending on meeting him at the door, and his voice calling out for her was unusual.

"I have a message for you, Killer... courtesy of Pickman Post." A dry chuckle, and then a low grunt of pain followed.

"What do you mean? Someone gave you a letter for me?" She felt the hairs stand slightly on the back of her neck. Who could it have been? Had Piper tracked her down? Had Preston gotten concerned? Or maybe... just maybe...

"I bumped into that mayor friend of yours. Not as friendly as you made him seem, I have to say."

"Hancock?" Nora climbed out of the chair she'd been sitting in, closing _Little Men_ and setting it on the coffee table. Then she turned down the hallway, heading towards him. "You saw Hancock? And he- Jesus Christ, Pickman, what happened?!"

"I told you," he smiled weakly, straining against the pain. "I bumped into your mayor friend." He slipped his shoes off, and stumbled as one foot seemed to refuse to obey him, smearing blood across the welcome mat instead. "Dammit. I liked that rug. Hard to find those rugs now, you know."

Nora caught his arm and steadied his balance for him, not wanting any further injury. "You're covered in blood, is this all yours?"

"A little might be his."

"A little?"

"He's fine. Had to slash his arm a bit to wriggle away, nothing serious. It wouldn't have been as bad as it ended up being if he'd been steadier himself... You think you have withdrawal issues, you should have seen his sorry state."

Nora's head was swimming. She compartmentalized her panic and pushed through to the most urgent of problems. "Do you need medical attention?"

"No, I should be fine... He got me pretty good in the back of the leg but one of those traveling doctors, the ah... the skinflint one, what's his name."

Nora rolled her eyes. "Weathers."

"That's the one! He dug it out for me, for a frankly ridiculous fee, and he was not gentle about it either! Honestly, today has just been a wash. I need to accept that."

She slipped under his arm and helped him to the stairs. "You need to be in bed so that can heal."

"My turn to play patient?"

"I think you'll find my bedside manner impeccable."

"Probably correct. Goodness, everything is a bit... spiny?"

"Based on the wound and your pants, and your skin, yeah... you've lost a lot of blood. Things are going to spin."

"I'll never get these stains out. I loved this suit..."

"What on earth did he do to you?"

"Ugh, thank you, yes, that's much better... He was looking for you and did not react well when I told him you were with me."

"Shit, seriously?"

"Don't judge him too harshly now... he was fairly strung-out and I do have a reputation."

"You're just the patron saint of junkies, aren't you?"

"Addiction can be one hell of a path to walk. Oh, must you cut them off?"

"Easiest way to get them off without causing any further aggravation to the wound. Besides, you already said you can't save them."

"Why did I get out of bed today?"

"I'm sorry, if it helps. I liked this suit too... Ouch. Not to rub salt into your wound, but whatever you paid Weathers? Way too much. I'm re-bandaging this."

"You probably don't have time, actually. You see, I need to give you the message and then you need to go outside."

"Outside?"

"He only let me come back alive if I promised you'd be outside within the first five minutes, and we're already past that by quite a few and-"

"Are you kidding me?"

* * *

He had not been kidding her.

Hancock was pacing in front of the door, shotgun in one hand, still bloody knife in the other. At the sound of the door, he turned to focus on her and his relief was visible. "Sunshine, thank God." Both weapons hit the ground with a clatter as he bounded towards her, reaching out. His arms pulled her in tight to his chest, and he exhaled deeply, warmth near her left ear. "When that murdering asshole told me you were locked up at his place-"

"Hancock, please, I'm fine." Nora pulled away almost as quickly and he let her slip away, busy in his complete surprise. She could see it in his suddenly wide eyes, not to mention feel it in the way his hands instinctively caught her arms to keep her from getting too far too quickly.

"What did he do to you? How long have you been captive?"

She couldn't help but snicker at the idea of being captured by Pickman, but it was only two short sounds before the resulting expression on his face cut her off. "I'm sorry, it's just I'm far from a prisoner here. Pickman isn't a danger to me, not at all. I appreciate you being concerned, but it's ok."

"It's ok?!" She could guess that was not the answer he had been expecting, to say the least.

"Yes. I'm here because I want to be. Which I'm sure Pickman told you, why didn't you just believe him?"

"Because that's crazy, that's why! You want to be here? Sleeping under the same roof as someone who mutilates scum and calls it art? No, fuck that. Come back to Goodneighbor. This is not a safe place for you." Hancock's voice was sharp, and his eyes were dark. He was angry, she knew that, it happened all the time, but unless Nora was wrong, there was something going on here that had never happened before.

"Are you angry at me?"

His mouth thinned. "Are you not going to come with me?"

"I don't think Goodneighbor is... I don't think I should be there. I'm trying to kick the psycho, and I really do feel better here. Pickman has like, the largest supply of addictol I've ever friggin' seen, and... Hancock? What's wrong?"

His posture had changed entirely; he closed up tight, shut off from her entirely. "Pickman... is helping you? Pickman?" His fingers dug tight into her arms as his grip tightened. "You're kidding me... tell me that you're fucking joking because if you're willing to spill a secret like that to a fucking SERIAL KILLER while you leave me in the GODDAMN DARK-"

Nora tore herself from his grasp, almost stumbling in her rush to back away. "You swore you would never judge me about anything-"

"This isn't fucking JUDGEMENT. You, you just swirl through my town and you captivate my whole world and you keep secrets that you should have NEVER even THOUGHT of keeping from me, ME, the most chem-happy junkie in the entire damn Commonwealth for shit's sake! But no, you lock it up, and you shoot up alone, and you gamble with odds you can't win and then you confide in a murdering fucking painter rather than turn to me for help?"

Her chest was tight, eyes swimming. "I'm sorry... I just... I didn't want you to know.. I didn't want to admit it, and Pickman is just-"

"Stop. I don't want to know, I don't want to know what you two do or why you stay or-"

"What the hell, John!"

"No, what the hell to you, Nora." He emphasized the syllables, and she winced. Why was she only Nora again? Why did that sting so much? "You said you were going back to Sanctuary, dammit!"

"I did go back to Sanctuary."

"A week ago!"

"How did you know it's been a week? I didn't even know its been a week!"

"I know it because Preston told me!"

"I told you in my note I was fine, you don't need to check up on me-"

"In your note? Which note? Oh! That scrap of paper you left behind after you ran out on me?"

"I did NOT run out-"

"Don't bullshit me, Nora!"

She felt like she could crumble up on the pavement. "Since when am I Nora?"

Hancock was more than ready to shoot back an answer, but the door behind them opened once again, distracting them both. Leaning heavily against the frame, it was clear that Pickman was in considerable pain as he lifted his gun, but his hands were steady despite it. "I suggest you believe that Nora is safe here and that she is staying under nobody's will but her own. You have upset her, to say nothing of my grief over the loss of my second best suit. I suggest you get off my property and that you do not return... or do I need to shoot out one of your knees to make my point?"


	22. Secrets Inside Circuits

When the reporter and the doctor turned up, Kellogg did exactly what he said he would do. He stayed silent, hid himself away using various tricks of the program he'd been able to hijack that not even Nick himself knew was there. It was easy to manipulate the old model's circuits. The coding blended together seamlessly, even if it was a tight fit, space wise.

He wasn't worried about anything, not even when the the doctor called for help from the Railroad. In fact, he almost felt excited when one technician sighed as he examined Nick's shoulder and bemoaned the lack of a particular part. "I know just the one it is," he said, "but the ones I have are from the Gen 3s and won't fit into your spacing."

"Shame all that tech was destroyed... I mean, don't get me wrong, I'm glad we don't need to worry about the Institute anymore-"

 _What?_

"-just wish we could have saved the research, you know?"

"No, I get it man, I do I just- Whoa, hold up, something's going on here, look at those spikes."

"Shit. He's turned off, right? You think he can feel pain or something?"

"How would I know that?"

He found the information buried so deep, encoded so thickly, that he would never have found it the main CPU hadn't been switched off. All the firewalls, all the protocols and fail safes? They were disconnected and he was free to dig, dig, dig until he struck gold. It was an entire folder of Institute related memories, compressed until they were mostly static.

 _No... No, that can't be right!_

* * *

 _The thing about hiding inside Nicky is that it means I end up sharing a lot of his consciousness._  
 _Everything he sees, everything that beams through whatever mechanical magic it is operating those eyeballs of his; I see it all too. I see it like those eyes are my own, but I know they aren't because of one crucial fact: I can't control the view._

 _I just get to watch._

 _Lucky me._

 _Trapped inside a tin can, spending the bulk of it having to deal with shy glances and longing looks. But hey, who could blame him. He's traveling with HER, with the greatest hero the Commonwealth has ever known! You know the one, the savior from the Vault! She started from the bottom, she's risen from the ashes, she's built cities and commanded armies of all sizes, etc... etc..._

 _Oh, and along the way she also shot me dead._

 _Lucky me._

 _Lucky fucking me, who gets to listen to her laughter whenever the dick cracks a stupid old world joke, and who gets to watch her face light up whenever that mutt bounds across Sanctuary to greet her. I get to listen to the sound of her voice when she boasts about her progress, when she cries into his shoulder..._

 _Our shoulder?_

 _Most of the time, I have to admit, it's all that keeps me from going insane. Every time she smiles, or laughs, Fuck, does it get to me. Anger. Rage. Something to focus on. It's a trick I've used before, when jobs go south or I need to get a hold of myself-_

 _Heh. 'Hold of Myself.' Can't remember the last time I did that._

 _Wonder when the last time ol' Nicky did._

 _He can, I know that. Discovered it one day while working through his circuitry, learning my way around under a standard diagnostic check. He just doesn't._

 _He thinks about it a lot though._

 _Thinks about Nora a lot._

 _So I thought about her a lot too. Calculated She is fucking incredible, almost too incredible, as far as I'm concerned. Not just because she took me out, no, but because of what else I've seen her do._

 _Guess it coulda been the chems, now that I look back..._

 _Anyhow, someone like that? Someone with the determination to track me down like she did? To extract what she did from a blob of brain with a computer port shoved in?_

 _I never once doubted that she would find Shaun. I always knew she would make it to the Institute._

 _That's the kind of woman she is._

 _Determined. Calculated._

 _Desperate._

 _Not surprised Nicky fell for her. Surprised she returned the feelings though, but it just made my plan all the easier to fall into place. Once all seemed bright and happy, I started to sabotage. Started to make Nick doubt himself, question if he was good enough, let him know what I could do... Once she had made contact, I would turn it all up even higher. I figured all I had to do was flood his system, increase the errors, take more control and break down as much of him as it took before she was begging Father to please, please fix the Synth she loved so damn much?_

 _Of course they'd say yes. They'd want him back. I know the files on Nick and that weirdo brother of his, how they broke out once upon a time. He's always been low priority for the Institute, so they left him alone, figuring he'd be useful for data at some point for some project._

 _But if he turned up in a heap on their doorstep?_

 _Not like they're going to just kick him back out._

 _No, they'd wanna scan him. Get him back online somehow. Poke around in the ruins and see what can be learned from._

 _And then? Then I get discovered by the only people who can pull me out of this bot and restore me to a body of my own._

 _That was the plan. Now I'm never getting out._

 _I really need to stop underestimating her._


	23. Admitting a Problem is the First Step

Hancock hadn't known where to go after Nora turned her back on him. For an hour after the door closed he'd just stood there, shocked at what had just happened. She had just walked up the stairs, right into the damn place through the goddamn front door. Just as it had closed behind them, he'd watched as Pickman put a hand on her back, a glimpse of familiarity that made him want to tear out a throat.

That had inspired him to go and do just that. He couldn't remember the last time he'd felt a lust for blood like this. Musta been way before he even became Mayor. Good. He was overdue. Time to catch up.

Of course it never happened. All that happened was he made it back to Goodneighbor. His head was spinning from chems and lack of chems and the side order of dehydration wasn't ideal either.

He'd made it up the spiral staircase and thrown himself across what he thought was the cleanest rug in the office. "Fahr!" he'd bellowed from the floor, "Water!"

"Did I hear correctly? Hancock ordering nothing but plain old water?" She sighed as soon as she saw the expression on his face. "Where is she?"

"Not really up for questions right now. Water?"

She set down two bottled and helped him rise into a sitting position. Then she just sat beside him, facing the opposite direction. He didn't protest or react in any way, but he was grateful and she knew it. Somehow Fahrenheit could always tell when he didn't want to be alone. He wondered how she did it. Did he have a tell he didn't know about?

He lit himself a smoke and inhaled, steadying his breath as he drew in the nicotine, or maybe it was the other way around. Either way, his shaking was going down. He drained the first bottle and most of the second before lighting his second.

"Gotta say, didn't expect to see you come back alone," Fahrenheit didn't move, and he knew she wasn't looking for an answer. "She still MIA?"

"Oh no, I made contact." He coughed a few times, rolling his arms back, listening to the pops in his shoulders. Couldn't remember aching like this before, like every inch of his was pulling against the other.

"So... what happened?"

"Never took you for a romantic, Farh."

"Shut your face, answer the question."

He spat the word, bitter at the back of his tongue. "Pickman." He finished the second bottle and heaved himself back up on his feet.

"Jesus Christ... Boss, I'm.. I don't know what to say. Of all the ways she could have gone-"

He turned from the cabinet he was riffling through. "She's not dead."

"Well then what is it? Some sort of a hostage situation? Cause if you need help getting her back you just say the word."

His laugh was just ever so slightly manic. He popped open bottle after bottle, dug out a lukewarm bottle of Vim and guzzled them all down. "If only it were that fucking simple. No, she's there because she wants to be there."

"I... Wait. Nora is, what, visiting Pickman right now? Having lunch? Why would she do-"

There was a burst of broken glass as yet another dent was made in the wall. "She's fucking living with him! Voluntarily sharing meals and probably everything else because maybe that's all Nora does."

"Whoa..." She spoke to him sternly, like a brahmin that dared to try and escape its pen. "You know you don't mean that. You're pissed, sure, but let's not say things like that."

"How the hell do you know if I'm wrong?" He paced, the pills forgotten, the desk across the room now his target. "We don't know who she is, ok? She's not some innocent, she's a liar, and she's a cheat, and she's untrustworthy and fuck, Fahrenheit, she told Pickman and she didn't tell me! He's pumping her with addictol cause the gallery apparently doubles as a fucking rehab center, did you know that? Isn't that fucking fascinating?!"

"Shit. She told Pickman about the psycho?"

It was like his head was on a swivel. He could hardly talk. "You.. You knew and I didn't?"

Her eyes widened, "Whoa... She didn't tell you?"

"How the fuck do YOU know? When did she tell you? WHY would she tell you and NOT ME?!"

"Hey, don't you fucking scream at me! She didn't tell me, ok? I figured it out on my own, using the brain you pay so much money for!"

He groaned and dug his palms into his sockets, fighting the urge to scream even harder. "Fuck! Fuck, ok, fine, fine! Fuck. I just... I just..." The pills were starting to kick in, the mentats first, the strongest, the smartest, holy fuck what was he even doing? "Jesus, I'm sorry Fahr..."

"I know. Don't. Just do better."

He nodded sharply and inhaled deeply, letting himself focus, straightening up the crooked thoughts and getting his emotions in order. "I know, I know.. I just keep messing everything up."

She put her hand on his shoulder, a rare display of comfort. "Permission to speak freely?"

"Granted."

"I think you're in too deep."

"Noted."

"No, I mean it... you binged with Nora, after Nora, now after After Nora? I know ghouls have a higher tolerance and I know you could smoke me under the table easily. But I also know this is too much even for you. Maybe a little less of Nora would be a good thing. She might be somewhere we think is ridiculous, but she's safe. You don't need to worry about her."

"I think you're worried about me."

"I think I've said what I need to say. Think it over. Anything else you need?"

"Nah. I'm good." The cocktail inside him was really working its magic, and he slumped down onto the couch, folding his hands on his chest, hat pulled low over his face."

"Ok. We'll talk more tomorrow."

She hadn't even closed the door before he was out cold.


	24. Cold Hard Facts

When he felt himself reboot, he instantly swept his body for Kellogg's imprint. When the scans all came back clean, he didn't even wait for his systems to load before he was talking, telling anyone who would listen that this was textbook Kellogg, that this was his plan, his scam to keep himself under wraps until he found the moment to spring.

Nick knew people like Kellogg. They weren't the type to lie down and give up.

He knocked over one of the techs in his haste to get out of the chair, to take Piper by the shoulders and insist they go over him again. Take him apart if they had to, he was in there, he was!

"Valentine, I understand that this situation has you under a lot of stress, to say the least, but I'm starting to take offense to your disbelief in my diagnoses."

"He told me he would do this!"

"You heard his voice telling you thing before as well-"

"This was different! This is real, he's really inside me and he is plotting and he needs to be stopped! Don't you tell me I don't know what's going on in my own head!"

He felt a hand on his still broken shoulder and jerked back to see Piper standing beside him.

"Nick, c'mon, maybe cut her some slack here. She's a HUMAN doctor. Maybe we just need a different kind of doctor for this, someone who knows more about synths. There has to be a way to sort this out for you." The sympathy in Piper's voice is powerful. She's using that tone, the one that always leads to people spilling their guts for her, and he sighed in defeat.

"You're right. My apologies, Amari... I'm taking my anger out on you. Means a lot to an old bot that you'd drag yourself all the way to Diamond City to check this for me."

The concerned doctor let out a sigh of her own. "It's frustrating for me as well. From what I know of you, you're not the type of man for dramatics like this. There has to be truth to what you're experiencing, but if it is inside you, I cannot get it out. I'm afraid I can't even recommend anyone... but I can at least put of feeler towards someone who can. There are a few people in the city I should talk to. They may be able to point us in a direction, however vague it might be."

"Appreciate it, Doc."

She nodded and gathered her things. "If either of you need me, I'll be staying at the Inn for a few days before I travel back to Goodneighbor. Good luck on your ends and I'll be in touch."

She and the technicians left together. The office was suddenly a lot bigger with just the two of them inside.

Piper spoke first. "I don't think it's you. I believe you that it's him... that it's Kellogg."

Nick dug through a drawer, pulling out a length of cloth. "Thanks." He created a makeshift sling for himself, protecting his still-injured arm. He'd just have to make do until a part surfaced somewhere.

"Is he... listening to us?"

"Probably. That was all he did for the first few months... a spy inside my own head. He plans to stick around until he can find a way to a body of his own. That's what he told me, anyway. Right before he swore that that he'd go back to playing dead if Amari, or any other tech got anywhere near me. He knows it's over if he's caught. Looks like he's a man of his word."

She peered into his face, as if trying to see Kellogg sitting inside his head, waving at her through his optics. "And he just talks to you? Tells you his plans and then what?"

"This isn't an interview, is it? I'm not going to see headlines of "Two Minds, One Synth" splashed on tomorrow's front page, am I?"

"Of course not. That's a terrible headline."

"Piper."

She held up her hands. "I give, I give... Nicky, I promise. This story is personal, and honestly? Too weird. How do you summarize this? It'd never end up being readable."

"How reassuring."

"C'mon, Nick. Seriously! I want to help, but in order to do that I need to know what we're dealing with. How long has he been speaking to you?" She settled herself in the spare chair across his desk, and he sat down heavily in his own. "Tell me everything."

"Months now. Started when I..." He stopped short, realizing she didn't know the half of how personal this story really was. Well, in for a penny, in for a pound. No going back now. "It started when I realized I was falling for Nora."

From there he was off to the races, and Piper followed every word. She interjected with a question once or twice. For the most part, he spoke uninterrupted, detailing the hatred the merc had for Nora, how he'd planned to kill her as soon as he got the chance, body or no body.

"He can control me now, from the inside." he finished, grimacing as he admitted it. "You saw me before you left compared to when you came back. Put a few good dents into me. It's not easy to dodge your own fists."

"He can hit you and not feel it?"

"Either that or he doesn't particularly care."

"That was serious damage, Nick. Kellogg could kill you!"

"The good news is that he admitted it takes a lot out of him. Doesn't seem he can do any lethal damage to me... at least not yet. Besides, I'm his only ride out of here. I don't think he could put me under. I've taken a few safety precautions up in the ol' noggin. They were the second thing I checked once the information was available to me. They're still running, all systems normal.

"What do you mean?"

"Rerouted the path of certain information, keywords, code phrases... I've limited his exposure to a lot of what's happened. His ultimate plan is using my body to reach the Institute is order to have his consciousness taken out and put back into a newer model."

"Oh my God... he doesn't know. The Institute is history. He's never getting out that way... you're hiding it from him to keep him from going ballistic, aren't you?"

"You sure you won't come work for me? At least part-time?"

"I've got enough enemies as it is, thanks. I don't need ex-cases coming back to haunt me as well as past articles. Now stop deflecting and answer me."

He looked away, trying to find the words. "I'm trying my best to keep his information level low... but he'll come across it eventually, one way or another. When he does... it's not me I'm worried about."

Comprehension dawned. "Of course. Nora. Nora is the one who blew up any chance he had."

"Not to mention she's the one who took him out in the first place. He's got... plans for her." His hands clenched atop the desk. "He hasn't told me the all the details... probably knows I'd destroy myself before he could touch her... But, Piper?" he raised his head and those bright yellow lights flashed. "He's told me enough to make me want to shut down for good."

"Oh Nick... Nick, we gotta do something, we can't just let this happen. What can we do?"

"I don't know what else to do other than bunker down and just wait it out. Either he goes first or I do."

"Nick, no. That's not a solution. That's giving up!"

"I'm not going to budge on this. All it takes is one chance. I won't give it to him. I will not put Nora in harm's way. I've been compromised!"

"She would never-"

"She's too important! I won't let it happen!"

"Nora would never want you to choose this path without at LEAST talking to her! If something happened to you and you never told her a word about what's going on? Nick... you know she would never forgive herself. Even if she didn't love you. That's just how she works, and you know it."

That one stung. He knew it was true.

He rose from his chair to cross the room, reaching the coat rack by the front door. He dug into the pocket of one of his hanging dusters. Extracting a pack he tapped out a cigarette, lit it and inhaled. "Nora... Nora needs to be kept safe. If I'm away from her, Kellogg is away from her."

"She would want you to fix this. Hell, she'd want to HELP you fix this."

"She can never be involved in this. She can't know. You have no idea the danger it would put her in." Smoke curled around him, and he closed his eyes as he felt the scent pour over him. The techs had done wonders when it came to cleaning the fans inside him. It almost felt like his lungs were lungs once more.

Almost.

"You think I'm going to just let you sit here and rust? As if they'll solve everything?"

He turned to face her, and the look in his eyes... Piper was unable to describe it, something that rarely happened to her.

"He told me he would break her. He would do it with my hands. Not just kill her; break her. I can't trust myself... if she's left alone with me, I could, hell, he could make me... What he said he would do to her, shit, it's-" He broke off, rubbing his forehead with the heel of his palm, desperate to forget the threats, the images his hijacked mind had conjured up for him. He took another deep pull of useless nicotine. "And that's without knowing the truth about the Institute! If he finds out-"

"That's why we have to move on this! We need to stop him before that happens!"

"Do you have any idea how strong I actually am, Piper? Have you ever considered the damage I could do with just this hand alone?" He lifted up the left steel frame of fingers and thumb, incomplete, hopelessly robotic. "I can slash through skin, right down to the bone if I swing into the right spots. I can pinpoint those spots easily; one hundred percent accuracy at speeds that no human could ever hope to block, escape, or even really feel before the worst was over."

He dropped the hand, but not his gaze.

"He's going to make her feel every single second, for as long as she can."


	25. Back on the Dusty Trail

"So... you're back?"

"I'm back."

Preston shifted his weight, staring hard at her, trying to decide just how to react. It had been over three months since he'd last set eyes on Nora. Over three months since the night when she'd headed off to investigate those explosions and just never returned. He knew where she was, as the story of her living in Pickman's Gallery in an effort to recover from various reported illness had spread all over the Commonwealth.

Her hair was long again, like it had been when they'd first laid wide-eyes on each other way back when in Concord. She'd put on weight too, though he knew she'd never have the soft curves from prewar times again. Still, she looked better than he could remember. Looking at her, all clean and fresh, smiling... when had she last looked so healthy? So clear-eyed, and focused? The word 'rested' popped into his head. It was a perfect fit.

"Lotta people have been worried about you," he said.

"I know. And I am truly sorry. There's a lot of apologizing I need to do. Made a list, in fact."

She used to make lots of lists, back when she was still fresh to their way of life. Preston could remember her explaining that she always kept lists at home, of chores or shopping, and that lists had kept her steady in school. He imagined she'd made good use of them back as a lawyer as well, though she had never talked about those days.

He felt a hand on his arm, bringing him back to the present, and he looked first at it, and then at her quizzically. Her eyes were warm, and he felt something ease within him. They weren't shot through with red anymore; Not seedy from chem use or blurred from alcohol. He'd only meant to think it to himself, but then his mouth opened up and the words just flew out. "It's been a long, long time since I've seen your eyes this way."

She smiled, and there was nothing but warmth there too. "Long time since I've felt this good. I meant what I said. I'm back. I'm really back."

He hugged her hard, gun clattering to the ground beside them, all pretense of Minuteman etiquette dashed.

"Preston?"

"Damned good to see you again, General. No. Not General." He pulled back, his infamous smile somehow even brighter. "It's damned good to see you again, Nora."

~

The two strolled up the hill towards the heart of their once little settlement, swapping stories about the time that had passed. Most of the other settlers hardly glanced at them, but those who did often gave a double-take. Could that really be who they thought it was?

"The place looks great, seriously. I knew you'd be fine without me. Never doubted it for a second."

"We did our best. A few squabbles with a local raider camp have come up. Nothing that can't be dealt with now that you're here again. Unless you're finished with fights, of course."

She laughed, tossing her head back. "I may have lost my jagged edges but I'm not so far gone that I still don't enjoy a good Raider punch-up. Give me a day or two to catch up with everything and everyone I need to here. Then we'll go out together and they'll never bother Sanctuary again."

He parted ways with her when they reached her house. She waved goodbye before she went inside, happiness radiating off her. Once inside, Nora took a good hard look at the neglected space and then tied up her hair. She pulled open the curtains and let the sunshine stream inside, watching the dust dance around her for a few long moments. She stretched out her arms and exhaled.

It felt so good to be home.

~

She had been cleaning out her fridge when she heard someone knocking. "It's open!" she shouted, leaning back on her heels, grateful for the excuse to take a break.

The door was almost thrown open by a very excited Piper. "Blue! Oh, Blue, it's really you, I can't believe it! I thought Preston was trying to prank me when he said you were back, I missed you so much!" She pounced on Nora, almost knocking her to the floor.

"I missed you too, Pipes. An awful lot."

"My God, look at you. You look incredible! Damn, Blue. Man, this world really did a number on you, didn't it?"

"It did. But I can't put all the blame on the world. I fucked up plenty myself, and yes, before you say it, I know. One of those ways was by leaving without explaining."

"Nothing you can't make up for now. What d'ya say? Sounds like this could be quite the exclusive."

Nora laughed. "Ok, ok. Some of it you can print, I swear. But for the most part, let's not make this an interview. Right now, I just want to make some tea and catch up with a friend. Deal?"

"Deal."

~

Piper had always been an excellent audience for story-telling. She knew when to be silent, when to ask questions, and when to nod her head in all the right places. Best of all, you could tell her anything and trust that she knew what could be shared and what was only a secret, just for her own ears. She listened as Nora went over everything she'd been through, both during the battle against the Institute and after. She was no longer ashamed of any of her past.

It took hours to get the whole thing out, but Piper could have listened for days. It was quite a tale, the kind of redemption story that she knew could have lived on forever in print, easy. She'd never be able to print enough copies of A Life and Times of the Saviour of the Commonwealth. Nora was one of a kind. Maybe once she was a little older and the sting of all this had finally faded away, maybe then she'd let her publish something. It was an idea to keep at the back of her hat.

Also at the back of her hat was news that she knew Nora had to learn eventually. She planned to tell her, of course, but after she'd had her chance to talk. Nora deserved her own moment, one that wasn't interrupted by anything.

The sun was starting to lower when Nora had begun to wind her story to a close. "I knew that if I stayed here the psycho would continue to destroy me. Or that I'd turn to other chems as a way to manage it and it would all fall apart. I'd done enough damage... whatever Nick and I had been was gone, and when I think of how I treated Hancock... I owe him so much more of an apology than I think I can give. But I'm still going to try. Not sure how, or when I should, but... I will. I can now. I'm clean and I've dealt with the bulk of my trauma. I've made peace with what happened between Shaun and I. Made peace with whatever scraps of motherhood I was given, and what I chose to turn those into. It feels good."

Piper reached over to squeeze her hand. "It should. You worked damn hard to get to this point, Blue. There are a lot of people who wouldn't have managed to get through a half of what you have."

Nora smiled. "Thanks. I hope it's as easy talking to the others as it was to you. I somehow doubt it, though. Have you heard anything recently from GoodNeighbor?"

She shook her head. "Nothing out of the ordinary these days. Hancock did have a bad few weeks after he found you at Pickman's."

"Really?"

"Yeah. The place turned into a bit of a pit, even by their regular standards. But he straightened up eventually and everything has been smooth sailing ever since. I'm willing to bet Fahrenheit had more than a little to do with it."

Nora's worry visibly faded. "That woman, she is just incredible. You know, I really owe her a gift basket for all the trouble I've caused for her."

"We could tie up some whiskey with a ribbon? I think she likes whiskey best, but I'll double check."

"Do me an extra favour and find out what Ellie likes, though I'm not sure I can picture her wanting alcohol. I'm sure she's had to put up with a few rough spells at the Agency thanks to me." Her words had been light, and she'd been expecting a frothy response. Instead, the entire mood of the room seemed to change. She looked at Piper's suddenly grim face and all the worry can flooding back. "What is it? What did I say?"

Piper's eyes shifted, something she did only when she had bad news. "There have been some... developments in Diamond City. It's... well, it's the news I told you I had. I wanted you to have a chance to breath before you found out. I thought Preston might have told you actually, but he said you didn't ask about Nick, so he thought it best he didn't mention anything."

"This is about Nick? What is it?"

She poured another cup for both of them, and then set the pot down, taking both of Nora's hands in hers. "This isn't going to be easy to hear."

"Piper, please... you're starting to scare me. Just tell me. I can take it."

First, she nudged Nora's ashtray toward her. "You might want to light up for this one, ok?" She watched her tap out a smoke, noting the slight tremour of her fingers. "Ready?"

"I guess as ready as I'll ever be."

Piper nodded once, and then got down to business. "Do you remember what happened to Nick after the procedure at the Memory Den?"

Nora exhaled a plume of smoke above their heads. "The impression of Kellogg? How could I forget, it was terrifying."

"Well, It turns out that it was more serious that anyone could have known."

Nora put the cigarette down heavily. "You don't mean..."

"I do."

"Jesus Christ." Nora left the smoke to extinguish in the ashtray, rubbing her forehead with her palms. "It really was Kellogg after all? Like... controlling Nick?"

"Exactly."

"But even if it had actually been... been him..." She shook her head, and Piper knew she wasn't talking to her anymore. She was trying to talk it out so that it made sense. "I don't understand... that was so long ago... why didn't he tell me then? And why is it even an issue now?" She met Piper's eyes and now she knew they were back to a conversation. "Did Kellogg come back when I was gone?"

It wasn't unusual to have to give bad news in her line of work. She knew it was best to get it over with as quickly as possible, and she chose her words carefully. "It was an ongoing problem. He kept it secret, Nora. He didn't tell anyone about it, and the details are still pretty fuzzy but it looks like Kellogg never actually went away. That he was there at the back of Nick's mind, so to speak, waiting for a chance to properly take over Nick's body."

Nora looked at if she wanted to throw up. "That.. that can't be right. Piper, that isn't right, he wouldn't keep something like that from me. He just wouldn't!"

"He shouldn't have done it, I know. I gave him hell, believe me, but it's what he did. Kellogg has been fighting him for control for most of the past year., even to the point of taking over fully for as long as he could hold out, power-wise. Which hasn't been long, but-"

Nora suddenly shoved her chair back, rising to her feet, hands pulling from Piper's reach. "Where is he? I need to talk to him. I need to ask him why. Tell me where he is and I'll go, I'll go now!"

Piper stood up too. She kept her hands in front of her, feeling like she was talking Nora off a ledge. "I wish I could tell you, Nora. I really wish I could. But I can't."

"Why not?"

"Because I don't know, Nora. Nobody does. Nick took off almost two months ago. Nobody has seen him since." 


End file.
